


souls touch, and the future changes

by sunmoonandstars



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: (anymore), (dementors were involved), Dark Harry, Dark Harry Potter, Dark Magic, Evil Voldemort, Gen, Gray Harry Potter, Grey Harry, Grey Harry Potter, Harry Potter is Not a Horcrux, Harry doesn't like Muggles, Harry is a Little Shit, Harry's not a nice person, Hogwarts but with Logic, Hufflepuff Neville Longbottom, Manipulative Dumbledore, Orphanage AU, Slytherin Harry, Slytherin Harry Potter, Slytherin Politics, Slytherins Being Slytherins, Snape is confused and really just needs a headache-relief potion, Wizarding Politics, because McGonagall was in charge for 7 years, both could be considered accurate, dark and gray so people searching either tag might find it, he's not tom riddle part 2 but there are similarities, i'll add more if i think of them, idk what else to tag, really not canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2018-04-02
Packaged: 2019-03-28 01:44:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 95,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13893606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunmoonandstars/pseuds/sunmoonandstars
Summary: Albus Dumbledore watched two visionaries start as driven, powerful, brilliant young men, and become monsters. He has no heir, no protege of equal power to step in should another one rise, and he is old. So when he hears of a Chosen One with power the Dark Lord knows not, he thinks maybe he doesn't want this boy prophesied to defeat Lord Voldemort to grow up in the Wizarding world. He thinks of the bonds of family, and the opportunity he has to shape his world's politics, and of a corrupt magical elite who've signed on with two Dark Lords over hatred of Muggles. He thinks Harry Potter should grow up loved by his family, and Voldemort be destroyed so there is no need for Harry to ever realize his power, and he acts to make both of those things happen. Because he's Dumbledore and what he wants, he gets.Usually.When you dabble with improvised ritual magic, you should be aware there might be unforeseen consequences. For example: souls touch.





	1. The Boy Who Frightened Dumbledore

It is dark, and the room is cold.

Four living beings and one that is, while _being_ , not technically _living_ , occupy the room. The cold is the not-technically-living-being’s fault. Of the room’s other four occupants, three are aware of this, and one is too young to care about much other than that he is cold and his mum isn’t there to cast a warming charm.

The child is one year, four months, and five days old.

“Is everything ready?” The speaker is the man holding the child, a small, twitchy thing.

“Nearly, Elphias,” says a tall man in robes. “Nearly.”

Elphias rocks the young boy in his arms. The toddler’s sniffles begin progressing into active whimpers.

“Perhaps you could move a bit faster, Albus,” the final living-and-being occupant says tersely. The voice sounds vaguely feminine, and the speaker’s figure appears vaguely feminine, but they wear gray robes with the hood pulled up, and gloves, and a high collar, and the moving black runes on their cloak make it impossible to determine so much as skin color or a hint of a face existing under their cowl.

“Soul magic ought not be rushed,” says Albus. His long silver-streaked ginger beard is tucked into his belt to keep it out of the liquid pooled in the center of the room. It is black, and it could be water, reflecting the dimly lit ceiling. It could also be something else. “As you should know.”

“Yes, yes, but do get a move on, the Department has need of this chamber in an hour and we’ve no idea how long this will take.”

Albus hums and pours something into the pool of liquid. It looks less like water now. The ripples around whatever he’s pouring are far too sluggish to be water. “Patience… Does a dementor’s Kiss normally take very long at all?”

“This is no normal Kiss and you know it,” the vague figure hisses.

Elphias shifts on his feet. “Albus, this is… A Kiss… on a toddler… that is to say… you’re quite sure…?”

“As sure as I have ever been of anything in my life, old friend,” Albus says hoarsely. He peers at the liquid a bit longer through half-moon spectacles, nods, and rises to peer down at the boy instead. Elphias does the same and so does the third living being, although they do so rather grudgingly, with the air of someone looking over a curiosity they do not wish to admit is at all curious. “Young Mr. Potter has defeated Lord Voldemort through the purity of his soul and his magic… and in doing so, he has fragmented Voldemort’s soul beyond repair. I must find the pieces and destroy them. Starting with the one… that fled _here.”_

He presses one long finger lightly to the toddler’s forehead. The boy’s quiet, constant movement stops completely and his entire body shudders.

“Broken skin would indeed create a conduit for a soul shard,” the third speaker says drily. “In point of fact, it would rather be an invitation.”

“We understand blood magic so little,” Elphias says mournfully.

The third speaker snorts. “ _You_ understand it so little, Doge. The Department of Mysteries is not subject to the Ministry’s petty fear-mongering decrees.”

“Peace,” Albus says. “Now is not the time for political differences. Which Unspeakables are supposed to be above, anyway.”

Elphias Doge obeys instantly. The third speaker makes a sarcastic gesture of agreement and steps away again.

“Right,” the third speaker says brusquely. “Albus, the potion feels about right, and I’ve had the runes ready and waiting for thirty minutes, so can we _please_ get this show on the road?”

“Of course, of course… Elphias, if you could give the boy to me?”

Elphias licks his lips and looks in the direction of the windowless stone room’s fifth and final occupant. It drifts up near a corner and might possibly be forgotten, if not for the silver bird that floats in front of it, and the aura of misery and despair that it exudes like the scent of bad eggs. “Albus…”

“Trust me, Elphias,” Albus says softly. “Please.”

With a jerky nod, Elphias deposits the boy into Albus’ arms and leaves through a door that did not appear to exist before he needed it and appears to no longer exist once he is gone.

The third speaker snorts as soon as he is gone. “Purity of his soul my _arse_ , Albus, you know the boy’s mother did some _highly_ illegal ritual and fueled it with her own death. The batshit monstrosity killed himself with his own arrogance. Waltzed right into _your_ trap, I might add.”

“We both know you will be keeping such observations to yourself,” says Albus in a tone so delicate it might break upon the floor like spun glass. “The fiction will be a comfort to Elphias, and everyone else, and it is not even far from the truth. This world is in dire need of hope, my dear. And Harry Potter can offer it to them. A beacon of light, driving out the darkness…”

“Hope, ha,” the nameless speaker says. “There’s a reason I picked the Death Chamber and not Love, Albus.”

Albus doesn’t look at them, only at the child, as he pulls a slender length of wood from his pocket and taps it to the child.

In an instant, the child is entirely naked, and squalling louder at the sudden onslaught of cold.

“You know this has over an eighty percent chance of killing the child, right?”

Albus bends down, holding the child over the liquid like a prayer, or a sacrifice. “It must be done. The risk of one life to begin the process of killing a man who has killed hundreds and would kill hundreds more. I will carry the guilt forever but I shall do so without regret.”

“Your burden.”

“One among many,” Albus says, and in this, for the first time, they appear to be in perfect agreement.

The nameless speaker steps back, raising their own wand, and begins tracing complicated patterns in the air while chanting in a language no longer actively spoken. It is a language not-quite-dead, not-quite-alive.

They are dealing with a number of not-quite-dead, not-quite-alive things this night.

Albus lowers the boy slowly into the liquid. He is careful to not touch it himself, not so much as a drop on the trailing sleeves of his robes.

The liquid appears to have pooled in a very shallow depression in the middle of the room, whose floors all gently slope towards its center. It soon becomes clear that its center is much deeper than the visible planes of the floor would suggest. The toddler—Harry Potter—disappears completely as soon as Albus lets him go, and he does so with barely a ripple in the sluggish liquid. His unhappy infant cries cut off as the liquid closes over his face.

The silver bird fades out of existence at a flick of Albus’ wand. The chanting immediately grows faster, more frenzied. Trembles overtake the hands and body of the nameless one. In the corner, the not-quite-alive not-quite-dead being drifts forward, spectral and frightening and _hunting_.

It reaches for Albus, first, but the chanting picks up its pace and the creature stops. Redirects itself toward the pool.

There is no sign of Harry Potter, not anymore. Not from outside.

Even under the liquid he is causing very little disruption. His pudgy fists lie still and his feet kick spasmodically only once every few seconds. He is not breathing, but that is a side effect of the potion they’ve submerged him in; it will need to be forcibly and painfully extracted from him if he survives the next minute of his life.

Though he is a fighter by nature, the boy’s fight is directed entirely inwards at this moment. Inside him, the soul’s instinctive reaction to something that can obliterate it has slammed into action, and for this boy, it is magnified to several times its usual effect, for several reasons.

One, because he is young, and his magic is as yet unformed and wild and messy, and magic is the connection between mind and soul.

Two, because he is near death, another side effect of the potion, and the ties between his soul and his body are loosened almost to the point of snapping on their own.

Three, because he, technically, has one and one one hundred and twenty-eighth souls inside his body.

The extra one one hundred and twenty-eighth is the greatest source of his problems. It was not part of this body to begin with, so its connection is already comparatively weak. No magic can quite replicate the connection between a body and its original soul. Also, it is a particularly violent and unhinged piece of a particularly violent and unhinged soul, and its entire sense of self is built around an implacable fear of death, and ending. The only thing greater than that fear is the fate it feels approaching now, because while in death there is a _slight_ chance of something coming after, there is _no_ chance whatsoever of finding something else on the other side of a dementor’s Kiss.

Harry Potter’s body makes a particularly violent jerk, sending ripples through the liquid. The dementor pauses, face inches from submersion.

The chanting accelerates.

The foreign soul-shard shrieks and struggles. Its fear is strong and so is its instinct for self-preservation, and while it does not _think_ , per se, it is _aware_ and it can _plan_ , and it takes advantage of all the abilities left to it. Which are, admittedly, quite few. Its only chance is to somehow change places with the natural soul and sacrifice that one for the dementor, thus taking this vessel entirely for its own, or—or it can entwine itself so thoroughly with the natural soul that they are, in essence, indistinguishable. The parameters of this spell only allow the dementor to take a soul (or a soul fragment) that does not belong.

Outside the pool of liquid, Albus sighs as the dementor dips its face in.

The foreign soul-shard, however, has made one miscalculation. It has made no effort over the one month and five days of sharing a vessel to make nice with the natural soul. The natural soul, then, fights the foreign shard for all it is worth, with the blind instinct that comes from a soul’s overriding concern: stay with the born vessel at all costs.

Thus they struggle and the dementor nears.

Its clammy mouth touches the child’s lips. The Kiss is a bit of a misnomer for this process, frankly. Not only is it entirely unromantic and perverted on multiple levels, but a kiss would imply that both parties have some capacity for affection, have lips, have a shared understanding of what a kiss _means_. None of those things is true in this case.

The foreign soul-shard screams and fights and clings and loses (mostly). 

After several long seconds, the dementor lifts its face out of the liquid (there is no visible remnant of the potion anywhere on its face or robes) and retreats to its corner. It is more docile now. The soul-shard it has just consumed was much smaller than a typical soul but it was a delicious banquet of misery and fear and despair and all the negative emotions a dementor prizes, so the thing is temporarily easier to control.

“Done,” the nameless speaker rasps.

Albus moves swiftly, parting the potion with a wave of his wand and plucking the toddler from the bottom of six-foot-long indentation in the center of the room. The boy is blue-lipped and covered in blackish reside from the potion, which Albus no longer seems to care about getting on his hands, and he is neither breathing nor moving.

The nameless curses. “Albus, I can’t help, I’m spent…”

“I have this,” Albus says. His voice is perhaps not so confident as he might like but he resolutely points his wand at the child and begins murmuring incantations.

After thirty seconds, he is near to giving up.

After forty, young Harry Potter begins to seize and spasm, mouth gaping soundlessly. Albus briskly casts a spell known as _langlock_ , now commonly used as a prank spell but originally developed by Healers to stick a seizure patient’s tongue to the roof of their mouth and therefore prevent them swallowing it. He returns to his previous stream of nonstop incantations.

After almost a full minute of casting, the seizures turn into violent but less unnatural-looking heaves. Albus deftly turns the child as he vomits up more of the brackish potion than plausibly could have been contained in his very small body.

After just over a minute, more potion begins to seep from the child’s body’s access points (all of them, including his pores) and he begins wailing in earnest. The shrieks echo around the small stone chamber so obnoxiously that the nameless speaker clamps their hands over their ears. Albus conjures a steady, gentle stream of warm water to cleanse the potion from the child’s skin and holds the terrified, agonized toddler under it for ten long minutes.

All of the potion must be purged.

The nameless speaker sighs with relief when Albus levels a gentle drowsiness charm at the child and ends the spray of water. “Circe’s tits, Albus, that was awful.”

“Haven’t you seen it done before?”

“Not with a _kid_. I’m quite possibly the least maternal witch ever but that doesn’t mean I like seeing one _tortured_.”

“That was not torture,” Albus says. “That was necessity.”

“Right. I’m pretty sure cancer patients undergoing round after round of scourgifying magic wouldn’t call it torture, either.” The nameless speaker is, evidently, well versed in sarcasm. “Just ‘cause it’s justified, which I happen to agree this was, doesn’t make it any less torture.”

Albus frowns at them.

“But if that’s the fiction you need to keep your guilty burden from getting to heavy, fine, I won’t pop your delusion bubble.” The nameless speaker gathers themself up off the floor with apparent effort. “You’d have made a terrible Unspeakable, Albus. They don’t tend to like the moral kinds.”

“I’d imagine not,” Albus says.

“What now?”

Albus looks down at the boy in his arms. “Now… I tuck Mr. Potter away somewhere safe and far away from all this fame and nonsense, where he can grow up a normal little boy, while I make sure the monster that did this to him will never return.”

“Death Chamber, remember? And I’ve done my fair share of studies in Time. Some things are inevitable.” The nameless speaker leans forward and traces the rune on the child’s forehead. “Sowilo. Victory, power, the sun. His mother’s magic and Voldemort’s arrogance saved him, but this child is an exceptionally powerful wizard, Albus, and no amount of meddling with Fate will change that. No matter how much you try to avoid past mistakes.”

Albus’ laugh rings hollow in the small room. “You have done your research, haven’t you?”

“Never liked you in school, Albus, and I know full well the feeling was mutual so don’t insult me with denials. Of bloody course I did my research. My oaths bind me but—sometimes trying to dodge Fate just brings about the very thing you fear.”

“I appreciate the warning, my dear,” Albus says. He pulls the child away from that curious finger, closer to his own chest. “But I will be perfectly fine. You can handle the dementor, I take it?”

“Certainly.” The nameless speaker casts a Patronus with a flick of their wand and no incantation, which elicits an eyebrow raise from Albus. A silvery pine marten appears, dancing through the air and corralling the dementor back into its corner. “Go find Elphias and console him before he cries a river.”

“Don’t mock Elphias.”

“He’s my brother, I can mock him all I want, thanks.”

Albus sighs and leaves.

He pauses in the corridor. Glances once down at the bundle in his arms.

For all their differences, Albus and the nameless speaker are thinking something similar as they take their separate paths from the ritual chamber. They are both considering how unexpectedly well the experiment had gone. The child survived and the soul-shard was destroyed and the dementor only made one halfhearted attempt at slipping its bonds.

But there was something they did not know.

When the foreign soul-shard was clinging with all its might to the native one, when it was trying so desperately to survive, it left something behind. Not a piece. No, there was only one soul in Harry Potter’s body, and it was his own. But he was marked, now, on the inside as well as the outside, because no soul can come through such a struggle unscathed. An impression had been left on the essence of Harry Potter. No more invasive than fingerprints on the outside of a wine glass.

But invasive and significant are two different things, and the consequences of the battle between soul and soul-shard, which would go forever undiscovered, would nonetheless be felt the world over.

One day.

 

All across the country, men and women in robes and long hats gathered. It had been almost two months exactly since You-Know-Who fell, vanquished by a young boy so pure of magic that Fate herself decreed him the downfall of the Dark Lord. Whether they celebrated Christmas, or Yule, or one of the bloody pre-pre-Christianity rites, or nothing at all, they could celebrate that holiday season secure in the knowledge that terror had been vanquished.

Some children, however, were not so fortunate.

A young blond boy sobbed on his bed in the shaking arms of his mother, both of them picturing the third member of their family consigned to an awful fate.

Two parents celebrated with their remaining family, sickened by their own relief that it had been the Potter boy and not theirs. The boy, meanwhile, was crushed between all of them and heard by none.

Another boy shrank away from his father’s rage and fled to the family library. The books there were undeniably nasty but at least they never tried to pretend to be anything but. Also, for the one-and-a-half-year-old Heir of the family, they were slightly more lenient than they would be otherwise.

Words echoed on the other side of a door that a black-haired girl was not allowed to open, words like _betrothal_ and _Malfoy_ and _unpleasant business_ and _family’s only chance_ that she didn’t like but couldn’t ask about.

And in a cookie-cutter Muggle home in Surrey, Harry Potter slept in a battered half-broken hand-me-down crib that had been his cousin Dudley’s until Dudley smashed one of its legs. It only stood upright if you leaned it on the wall. It was nothing like Mum and Dada, it was weird and cold and foreign and his head hurt all the time, but—

Crying hadn’t gotten him anywhere.

So Harry Potter stopped wailing when his Aunt Tuney came in to yell at him for the racket and waking her Dudders, and he stayed quiet after she left, and the first foundation of a new life was laid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone just finding this at random: I wrote this in a stress-fueled frenzy while procrastinating on finals. It is unbetaed and the rest will be posted in bits over the next week. My other Slytherin Harry series, Sarcasm and Slytherins, takes priority and I'm working on finishing book 5 of that one. This is so my readers have something to do over the next 2-3 weeks while I'm on hiatus to finish book 5, at which point I will begin posting book 4. I'm not sure when I'll write or post the second book of this, but it will definitely happen, and definitely relatively soon. 
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	2. Survival of the Fittest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good morning everyone! I said i'd have more for you today and I do! 
> 
> one point i'd like to clear up before we go any further: a couple people in the comments yesterday were really salty about dumbledore doing the ritual on baby harry. yes, i'd agree technically it was torture of an innocent, & it wasn't *nice,* but this is still dumbledore. he still thought of the "raise harry with the dursleys, groom him so he sees his own life as less valuable than everyone else's, and pull puppet strings his whole life so he martyrs himself" plan. That had a 100% chance of Harry dying, probably at Voldie's hand, and it worked on the assumption that Voldemort would one day return. Also, it never guaranteed Harry's success--it said he would have the *power* to defeat the Dark Lord, not that he *would* defeat the Dark Lord, or would even want to. This ritual has a better shot of harry surviving than the Killing Curse (I contend that Dumbledore didn't know Harry would have the chance to come back, because who tests the killing curse on human horcruxes) even though it was awful and probably should have killed him. (I did want to show his thought process on this, but the very limited 3rd person narrator couldn't get in any of their heads, and I needed to have that perspective so I could describe the souls' battle for supremacy. It will come up later.)
> 
> Short version: Yeah Dumbledore does questionable shit but please don't hate him for last chapter-he was trying to combine necessity with the best chance of Harry surviving, and also never having to allow Voldemort to return in the first place.

**July 31, 1982**

It was his birthday. Harry knew that. But he hadn’t gotten anything except the same list of chores from yesterday. Simple things but annoying, and he had this idea that he shouldn’t be doing these things, and why couldn’t Aunt Tuney do them as quickly and easily as they’d just happened at home?

Right, Mum and Dada said Aunt Tuney was—something else… but he couldn’t remember what.

He couldn’t remember Mum and Dada much either. Harry felt like he should be sad about that but mostly he just wished he had someone other than spiders to hear his happy birthday song. Mum and Dada weren’t here, were they?

 

  **September 12, 1982**

“Dudders!”

Harry shrank back from Aunt Tuney’s shriek. It kind of hurt his ears.

Aunt Tuney pounced on Dudley and loaded his high chair up with food. Harry nibbled on the toast and eggs on his own. He wished he got a sippy cup. Dudley’s looked a lot easier and Harry got yelled at when he spilled his grown-up cup, but Aunt Tuney said he had to grow up fast and earn his keep, and he didn’t like the sound of it but he didn’t want Uncle Vernon to take away food like he had last week, so Harry didn’t say anything and just kept trying to use the grown-up cup.

 

**October 28, 1982**

It wasn’t fair. Harry scowled. He deserved the books more than Dudley. He could actually _read_ them, and he _wanted_ to read them, and all Dudley would do was tear them up and forget about them and maybe set the pages on fire with stolen matches. Okay, so Harry wasn’t that good at reading yet, but he was better than Dudley!

He could always… take the books later. Dudley wouldn’t notice. Not if Harry waited a week or two.

But everyone said stealing was wrong…

 

**November 30, 1982**

He took the books. And read them. No one noticed.

 

**December 25, 1982**

The Dursleys gave him a tatty winter parka, with stains, for Christmas. Dudley couldn’t even count as high as the number of presents he got. Harry stole one of the new books just ‘cause he could and retreated to his cupboard with a frown. Dudley was stupid and Christmas was stupid.

 

**May 14, 1983**

Harry knocked over a vase.

He hadn’t meant to. He never meant to _break_ the rules. The rules kept him out of trouble. Aunt Tuney’s rules, specifically. (She’d said to call her Aunt Petunia but he didn’t like the longer name so he only used it in person.) But this rule, about vacuuming the house once a week, was _hard_ , especially when the vacuum was taller than he was. And now he’d whacked a vase with it and the vase was in pieces on the floor and they didn’t even have a cat for him to blame it on.

Stupid vase, stupid vacuum, stupid Aunt Tuney making him do stupid things he couldn’t shouldn’t be doing—

Harry froze, mouth agape, as the pieces of the vase put themselves back together until it was sitting on the floor. Whole.

Okay. He picked it up. Pinched himself, so he wasn’t dreaming, ‘cause that’s what Dudley’s friends’ older siblings did to him all the time, while laughing, to check that he wasn’t stuck in a dream. It would’ve been more of a nightmare when they were around, but whatever. He pinched. He didn’t wake up. And there was the vase, which couldn’t have not broken falling from that height, which meant—

Which meant he’d _fixed_ it, somehow. Because there was no one else around. And it made more sense for Harry to have done something, hadn’t it, than for the vase to be some weird magical self-fixing vase?

He turned off the vacuum and grabbed the vase and ran upstairs. “Aunt Tuney! Aunt Tuney!”

Aunt Tuney suck her head out of her bedroom door, glaring. “What, boy?” 

Harry recoiled a bit but held up the vase. “Look!”

“What are you _doing_ touching that!” she shrieked, lunging out and snatching it.

“I fixed it!” he said. He was trying to stay happy but it was hard with her right there. “I wanted to show you…”

 _“Fixed_ it?” she said.

“Yeah—‘cause the vacuum’s hard, and taller than me—and the vase fell—but I wanted it fixed! And it’s fine, look!”

Aunt Tuney went white as a sheet. She darted out of her room and shut the door and grabbed the vase. “You are not to do that again!” she whispered harshly.

Harry frowned. Would she rather the vase stay broken? “But—I was trying to help—”

“You shouldn’t have broken it at all!”

She dragged him downstairs to the vacuum cleaner. “Here, boy?”

“Yes, Aunt Tuney.” That was another one of her rules—be polite.

Aunt Tuney stared at him for a few minutes. Harry stared back. He didn’t know what else to do.

Very quickly, she moved, and hit him on the back with the vase.

Harry cried out and fell. Confusion and anger made him slow and he couldn’t dodge when the vase came down again, hard enough this time to shatter on his hip bone.

Adults weren’t supposed to _hurt_ you. Adults were supposed to be _good_. He didn’t understand—

Dudley came running in from the kitchen. “What’s happened, Mum?” he said.

“The freak’s broken the vase,” Aunt Tuney said. “Clean it up, boy, and none of that _freakishness_ in my house!”

“Yes, Aunt T-Petunia,” he said dully, rolling over and getting to his hand and knees.

She huffed and flounced away.

Dudley kicked Harry in the side, right on his bruised ribs. He gasped and fell. One hand landed on a sharp bit of broken vase and sliced deep into the pad of his hand. He cried out again.

“STOP THAT RACKET!” Uncle Vernon bellowed. Harry shut up, shaking, in pain, so angry and so confused he couldn’t think.

Dudley laughed and lumbered back off toward the kitchen, saying something about cake. Aunt Tuney—no, Aunt _Petunia_ , weren’t nicknames for people you liked?—cooed at him.

Harry bit his lip to keep from crying out as he gathered up the shards.

 

**June 23, 1983**

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!”

Harry curled up in the corner of the living room. Aunt Petunia had allowed him some of the cast-off wrapping paper to play with and he was trying to fold it into the figure of Gandalf that he’d read about. Some of the things Gandalf could do—like make fire, or light—were kind of similar to Harry. He could light things up if he really thought about it, for a minute at least, and once he’d lit the stove without using a match.

Dudley and his friends played in the living room proper. Mums chatted in the kitchen. Aunt Petunia’s horsey laugh rang out from time to time. Harry tried to not pay attention. It was hard. Especially ‘cause Mickey had brought his new kitten Pounce along and Harry rather liked animals (for the simple reason that they weren’t nearly so hard to understand as people) but none of the other boys would let him near the cat.

It wasn’t fair. Dudley got _everything._

Well, Harry was starting to think that he’d have to just take things if he wanted them, so he waited until Pounce was kind of alone and the others were occupied with a remote-control dump truck before fixing his eyes on the cat. _Come over here_ , he willed. _Come on, come over to me…_

He’d always been good with animals. This was no exception. Harry grinned a little as Pounce stretched and trotted over without hesitation and settled into his lap. He petted the cat delightedly for a few minutes and relished its rumbling purr.

“Hey! Hey, freak, get away from my pet!”

Harry jumped about six inches. Pounce hissed and took off. A hand slammed into Harry’s shoulder and knocked him against the edge of the fireplace. Stars burst in his vision.

“Little freak can’t even stay upright,” someone laughed, and then they were gone again.

Slowly, Harry picked himself back up, scowling. The adults hadn’t seen. Aunt Petunia would just say he’d deserved it if they had.

The other boys were going back to playing with Dudley’s new toys.

Harry narrowed his eyes.

Pounce yowled and launched himself down off a cabinet onto Dudley’s head, sinking in his claws and raking them along his scalp. Dudley screamed.

Harry smiled.

Then Dudley hit Pounce off his own head and into the wall. The cat let out a pained wail and took off running.

The birthday party turned into a shouting match about Mickey’s crazy cat. No one thought of Harry, sitting in the corner hugging his knees and watching with secret delight. Even if he _did_ feel bad about Pounce getting thrown into the wall, and coaxed the cat out of hiding later, running his hands over tender ribs and thinking healing thoughts.

No one except Aunt Petunia. She gave him the stink-eye all afternoon.

 

**August 21, 1983**

He’d tried. Harry had really, honestly tried.

For months. Two whole months, since Dudley’s birthday, he hadn’t done any… _freakishness_. Not even where they couldn’t see in case it left a smell or something. Aunt Petunia had been mean to him before the freakishness started happening but he thought, maybe if he just _stopped_ , if he proved he could be _normal_ …

It hadn’t worked.

The toaster made him jump. “Hurry up, boy,” Uncle Vernon grunted.

Harry got the toast out with shaking fingers. He glared at his stupid hands. Dudley was creepy good at telling when he was afraid and shaking hands was a dead giveaway.

“And more butter this time!” Uncle Vernon barked, almost making Harry drop the butter dish.

“None of _that_ ,” Aunt Petunia said, snatching Harry’s own toast. She put it on a plate with Dudley’s and set the table. “Water for you, boy, until we’re done and the kitchen’s clean.”

Harry’s stomach growled. “Okay.”

Uncle Vernon banged his hands down on the table. “Show some respect, boy, or I’ll beat it into you!”

“I… okay, Aunt Petunia?” Confusion again—Harry was always confused nowadays. He felt like this was wrong but—what else did he know?

Uncle Vernon could really move fast for a man as fat as him. In a second he was out of his chair and in another he’d knocked Harry to the floor. “Say it again like you _mean_ it, freak,” he yelled.

“Yes, Aunt Petunia,” Harry said dully. They saw his confusion and it set them off. He just wouldn’t show it.

“Better,” Uncle Vernon growled, and stomped back to his seat.

 

**August 25, 1983**

Uncle Vernon’s paper caught on fire in his hands.

He leaped back bellowing about the pain. Dudley screamed and broke a plate. Aunt Petunia glared at Harry.

Curled in his cupboard later around bruised ribs and a sore wrist and a bloody nose, Harry thought it was worth it.

 

**September 17, 1983**

Harry finished weeding, careful not to pull any plants Aunt Petunia wanted to keep. The last time that happened he was locked outside all night and it was starting to get cold. He sneaked upstairs, collected two books, and went back to his cupboard.

Dudley never noticed the books missing. Harry never took too many and he put them back so the shelves didn’t get empty. He could make light inside the cupboard now, and the spiders and cobwebs and creaky corners of it looked sadder in freakish-light than they did by his single bulb, but the freakish-light was brighter than the electric one. And steadier. Also, Harry controlled it. Unlike most things in his life.

 

**October 31, 1983**

Harry was having a rotten day.

First, one of his normal pranks went way wrong. It was a stupid petty thing he did to get back at Dudley for beating him up around the breakfast table the week before, basically just holding Dudley’s socks and thinking itchy thoughts while he did the laundry. Except Aunt Petunia saw him and she connected the weird moment with Dudley’s complaints of itchy feet, so then Harry got stuck in the cupboard all day with no food.

He was starving and barely holding his pee when Uncle Vernon let him out, but he was only allowed a minute in the bathroom before Aunt Petunia dragged him off to help her carry the groceries. Then, in the Tesco, some stupid lady dropped her eggs while Harry was nearby getting the milk, and then Aunt Petunia came running and blamed the whole scene on Harry. So he didn’t end up getting anything for dinner when they got home even though he cooked the whole thing.

Kids started knocking around six. Dudley wouldn’t shut up. He was whinging about wanting to do whatever the other kids were doing. Aunt Petunia said “no,” even when he threw the biggest tantrum Harry had ever seen. Apparently Halloween was “pagan,” whatever that meant, so they wouldn’t be doing it.

Whatever. Harry had spent enough time around Dudley and his rotating circle of friends. If they liked something, it was probably stupid, so since Dudley wanted to join in on this, Harry didn’t.

 

**December 24, 1983**

Dudley sat outside Harry’s cupboard with leftover Christmas roast for an hour, eating it slowly. Dudley could be a right twat sometimes. (Harry didn’t know what “twat” meant, exactly, but he’d heard it on the telly right before Aunt Petunia scolded Uncle Vernon for listening to people who used that kind of language, so if it was bad it probably fit Dudley just fine.)

He fell asleep huddled in a cold ball under his thin blanket. It was a cold evening and the downstairs radiators cut off overnight.

 _I just want to be warm_ , Harry thought desperately. _I just want to be warm._

 

**December 25, 1983**

The blanket was toasty warm when he woke up. It stayed that way for all four hours Harry sat under the stairs and Dudley opened his presents. It was back to being a normal blanket after he cooked a Christmas brunch and stole himself enough food to last until the next day, but Harry remembered, and tried to do the warmth thing again on purpose.

It took him about an hour and a lot of headaches but he could heat the blanket up and make it stay that way.

Harry fell asleep with a frown. On the one hand, he was a freak and that was why Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon didn’t like him. On the other, his freakishness kept him warm at night, and helped him get away from Dudley sometimes, and convinced the neighborhood cats and dogs to be nice to him and mean to Dudley. So it couldn’t be _all_ bad.

 

**January 31, 1984**

“What are you doing out here, young man?”

Harry peered unhappily up at the stranger. He wasn’t supposed to talk to strangers. It was one of few rules he actually agreed with. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon were awful enough, and they were _family_ ; what would total strangers do to a freak like him? 

So he tended to avoid adults he didn’t know.

This one, though, he probably couldn’t escape. He had to sit here on this bench and wait for Aunt Petunia to bring Dudley back from the toy store across the street. Otherwise he’d get in trouble and he was already feeling weak from two days of no food. “I’m waiting on my aunt,” he said.

“Where is she?”

“…shopping.”

“And she left you out here?”

Harry’s eyes widened a bit. That was another rule: don’t draw attention. Except this rule was his, not Aunt Petunia’s. Attention was almost always bad unless he was controlling where it came from and why he was getting it. “I like it outside.”

“Hm.” The man squatted in the snow. “Why haven’t you got shoes?”

“They hurt my feet.” He wasn’t lying, even. They did. If only ‘cause they were Piers’ before he outgrew them and didn’t fit well. It was the better choice compared to Dudley’s old shoes, which flopped like boats and slowed him down when he had to run from other children.

“Aren’t you cold?”

Harry tugged his old, ratty jacket tighter. “No.”

“You should have a warmer jacket, my boy, it’s nearly below zero out here.”

The words slipped out before he could stop them. “Freaks like me d’serve it.”

The stranger’s eyes widened. “Freaks?”

“I’m a freak,” Harry said unhappily. Come to think of it, Aunt Petunia would probably call this man a freak too, what with the long funny dress thing he was wearing.

“Says who?”

“Says my aunt.” He’d already drawn the attention. Might as well see where this went.

“What’s your name, my boy?”

Harry tried not to frown. He didn’t like the thought of belonging to anyone, much less a random stranger. “Henry Polkiss.”

“Well, Mr. Polkiss, what do you think of the people who call you a freak?” the man said.

“They’re mean.” Not just to Harry, either. Dudley picked on other kids. Aunt Petunia was mean when she talked about the neighbors and Uncle Vernon was mean when he talked about his coworkers.

The other man nodded. “And if they’re mean, does it matter what they think of you?”

Harry cocked his head. Huh. He hadn’t thought of that, but it made sense. “No.”

Actually. Why did it matter what anyone thought of him? They were all pathetic, anyway. Dudley and his little friends. Aunt Petunia and her gossiping garden society. None of them had his freakishness. And okay, it was freakish, but it was also helpful. And special.

  “Here.” The man pulled out a bit of weird, heavy paper and scribbled something on it. “If you ever need help, call me, okay? Here’s my name and number—you can read, right?”

“Of _course_ ,” Harry said, sitting stiffly upright. He wasn’t an _idiot!_

The man raised his hands. “I meant no offense.”

Harry slowly uncoiled and took the paper. He didn’t look at it.

The man sighed. “Have a nice night, young man.”

Something about his weird dress robe thing looked familiar. Harry frowned at the stranger’s back as he walked away.

 _Jarred Jigger_ , the paper read, followed by a phone number. Harry stuffed it into his pocket and knew he’d never call.

 

**June 28, 1984**

_“Stupid dead grass, all itchy, can’t the soft landplodders take care of their own territory? If they must claim it they should look after it but nooo…”_

Harry froze.

The grass snake ignored him and kept on moving across the lawn. _“…they let it get all dry and dead like this! Haven’t they heard of water?”_

_“Er, are you talking?”_

The snake stopped dead and picked up its head. _“Is the stupid landplodder hatchling speaking?”_

_“Obviously,” Harry said._

The snake hissed. _“Don’t be an idiot, landplodder, it’s_ not _obvious! All you lot ever do is grunt at each other most of the time, how was I supposed to know you speak Parseltongue?”_

 _“Parsel-what?”_ Harry wasn’t used to feeling stupid. He didn’t like it.

_“Parseltongue. Snake language.”_

_“I don’t know that.”_

_“Yes you do, you’re speaking it.”_

Harry concentrated. _“I’m speaking… another language… okay, I kind of hear it now.”_ Amazing. _“How can I do this?”_

 _“I’ve no idea_ ,” the snake said indifferently. _“Nor do I care. Why is your territory so badly looked after, landplodder?”_

 _“I’m sorry,”_ Harry said. _“It’s not raining enough, so we can’t use too much water, so the lawn is dying.”_

The snake made an irritated noise. _“Stupid landplodders. I’ll go down by the river.”_

It disappeared. Harry sat down hard and wondered what had just happened.

The other animals did as he willed them if he concentrated hard enough but _talking_ was a whole other story. More proof he was special. Different.

 

**July 13, 1984**

The snakes came around a lot once they learned there was a landplodder who spoke their language. Harry kind of started to enjoy gardening just because he got to talk to them. The snakes were totally different from any of Dudley’s stupid friends. For one thing, they didn’t seem to hate him on reflex. They weren’t _friends_ , per se, because snakes didn’t do friendship, but they were allies. The snakes thought Harry was “a somewhat interesting diversion,” as one of them called him, which he took to mean they thought he was interesting enough to come see for themselves. None of them had ever met a landplodder who spoke Parseltongue. He liked that he had such a rare skill.

On this particular day, Harry was talking to a snake whose name sounded something like Sarateri. They had this whole system based on complex scent patterns, and a name was based off of scent. Harry was always a bit sad that with his weak landplodder nose he couldn’t tell the snakes apart like they did. Although he liked how his Parseltongue name sounded.

 _“Potenji,”_ and there it was, _“where have you been?”_

 _“Sorry, Sarateri.”_ He picked up the black snake and let her sit on his shoulders. Most of them liked that, for the warmth. _“Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon left me with Aunt Marge for a week while they were on vacation.”_

And an absolutely awful week it had been.

_“I smell blood.”_

_“I have a dog bite. It’s mostly healed.”_

_“Where is the beast? I will bite it!”_

_“Nowhere near here, Sarateri, but thanks, I’ll keep that in mind when Marge comes to visit,”_ Harry said. Ripper was one of very few animals who just hated him on sight and didn’t listen to his weird ability to influence them.

 _“Why must you stay with your landplodders?”_ Sarateri demanded.

_“They’re family.”_

Sarateri did the snake version of a snort. _“The female landplodder is your egg-mother’s hatchmate, that is all.”_

_“Parents are important.”_

_“Why?”_

Harry blinked. _“Er…”_

 _“What did they do for you?”_ Sarateri said impatiently. _“They’re not here, are they? Who cares? My egg-mother made sure we were alive and healthy enough to hunt, and then she left, as is proper.”_

_“For snakes, maybe.”_

_“Yes, and we have it easier. Snakes do alliances, not silly landplodder notions of family.”_

Harry frowned. _“But don’t you snakes like… your heritage? Breed honor, or something?”_

_“Well, obviously. I’m an Egyptian asp, escaped from a landplodder snake breeder, and I will defend my species as long as I live. That matters. Terrajoress and Hessa and Ilvssi, they matter, I have alliances with them. Why care about an egg-mother who I don’t remember? Pft. Landplodders are stupid.”_

_“I wish I could be a snake_ ,” Harry complained. They certainly seemed to have it easier. If he was a snake, he could just take off, leave the Dursleys…

_“You can be.”_

_“I haven’t got scales!”_

_“On the inside, you foolish landplodder.”_

Well. Maybe. A little. _“How do I do that?”_

 _“Snakes are smarter than landplodders,”_ Sarateri said loftily. _“We don’t bother with trivialities. We value the important things: survival, cleverness, victory, resourcefulness. Snakes do not trust; snakes strike at their enemies’ weakest moment; snakes leave no trace of a rival left to return and challenge them later.”_

Harry didn’t know what exactly she meant. He thought he got the gist, though. _“So like… stay alive no matter what, and then don’t let anyone hurt you?”_

Serateri let out a hissy sort of laugh. _“Close enough for now, hatchling. Close enough”_

 

**August 18, 1984**

“In the car, boy.”

“Yes, Uncle Vernon,” Harry said stiffly. Frog spawn, how he hated his uncle.

He almost giggled when he realized he’d picked up on a snakey curse. Aunt Petunia scolded Dudley for saying _damn_ once. Frog spawn seemed kind of the same thing, for snakes. That and _wormfood_. Although _wormfood_ seemed like a really bad insult because Serateri killed a grass snake once for calling her ally Terrajoress that. Terrajoress was very clever and good at guessing weather changes but he was slow and a bit silly with things like hunting. Serateri protected him, and Terrajoress made sure she and her other allies knew about storms, rains, floods, droughts, and all the other things that Harry barely thought about but that were huge to the snakes.

Uncle Vernon got into the front seat hard enough to shake the car and slammed the door. Aunt Petunia got in on the other side. Dudley’s fat face pressed against the window of the cat lady’s house across the street, gaping. He’d screamed for _ages_ about being left behind.

Harry sat quietly in the backseat of the car. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia hated when he asked questions. Also, Harry hated seeming like he didn’t know something, since that was more or less an invitation for Dudley’s friends to make fun of him, so really it worked out for the best. Even if he was horribly curious.

They drove for ages. It was even longer than the trip to Aunt Marge’s house, which was the farthest Harry had ever been from Number 4, Privet Drive. It felt like hours and hours and hours. He missed Serateri and his books and wished he had something to do or someone to talk to.

“Boy. Wake up,” Aunt Petunia snapped.

Harry blinked and opened his eyes. He must’ve fallen asleep. That helped. Although now he _really_ had no idea where they were.

The sky was still blue overhead but he’d never seen the building in front of him before. It had a bigger property than most of the other mismatched run-down houses in this neighborhood. The building itself was also bigger, and uglier. There was a sign over to one side but Harry couldn’t read it; the car was already past it and moving up the driveway.

A few trees went by and suddenly he could see a playground. Harry frowned. It was… well enough, painted bright colors and no broken swings or anything, but still. There were children playing on it. Just like Dudley and his friends. Stupid childish games.

Were Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon trying to make him make friends? Something to keep him from “corrupting” their “precious Dudders?” (Terrajoress explained what _corrupt_ meant, using a log that split apart when Harry kicked it because the whole inside was rotten with mold. He didn’t see how he could be doing anything similar to Dudley so either Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon were stupider than he thought or he was still too young to get it.)

Or maybe it was like preschool. They wanted to put Dudley in one this year but that would leave just Harry home, or so they’d said in the kitchen one night. Harry didn’t think Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon knew he could hear everything they said in there. So it could be a school…

Uncle Vernon marched up to the front door. The porch creaked under his feet. Harry stood behind Aunt Petunia and fidgeted. He didn’t like the look of the rickety chairs around them. And the paint was in pretty good shape but peeling a little.

Someone yanked the door open. “Yeah?”

“Who’s in charge here?” Uncle Vernon barked, glaring down at the kid who’d opened the door.

“Sister Silesia,” the kid said. He looked like he was a few years older than Harry. His expression reminded Harry of Piers’ on a bad day. Harry decided he did not like this kid at all.

“Well, take us to her, then,” Uncle Vernon said.

“C’mon, then.” The boy turned and walked away.

Aunt Petunia made a face. Probably at the boy’s bad manners. She was always yelling at Harry for his bad manners.

The building had a room at the front that kind of looked like the lobby of the dentist they’d gone to for Dudley a few months ago. There was a desk off to one side but no one sitting behind it, and a few sad chairs and sofas. The boy led them past the desk and through a door. On the other side was a hallway, stretching out to the left and right and also going straight ahead.

“Well, go on, give us a tour, then,” Aunt Petunia said stiffly.

“These’re the Sisters’ offices and rooms, to the left and right,” the boy said. “Kitchen and dining hall are straight ahead of us. Upstairs is the playroom, the rec room, our bedrooms, and stuff. It’s not that complicated, lady.”

“Excuse _me_!” Aunt Petunia drew herself stiffly upright. “I have never _seen_ such rudeness—”

“Sorry, lady.”

Maybe Harry didn’t dislike him _that_ much, if the boy was willing to be rude to Aunt Petunia.

He was glad when the boy led them into one of the nearby offices. Harry saw a stairwell down the hall, by a side door that pointed the direction of the playground. There was a flicker of movement in the stairwell. He took a step that direction but Aunt Petunia latched onto his shoulder hard enough to bruise and dragged him towards the office.

“Are you in charge of this place?” Uncle Vernon was already demanding. The boy left again, elbowing Harry in the side on the way. Harry took it back. Rudeness didn’t matter; he still didn’t like the boy.

Aunt Petunia gripped harder and he scrambled to stay at her side. They followed Uncle Vernon. Harry dodged a swat from his uncle and sat down in one of the visitors’ chairs. There were mismatched colorful paintings on the walls but Harry didn’t so much as look at them.

If Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon had let him ask questions he would’ve asked why the woman was wearing such a funny outfit.

“Welcome to Saint Hedwig’s,” the woman said politely. “My name is Sister Silesia, the matron of this institution.”  

“Vernon and Petunia Dursley,” Uncle Vernon said.

Aunt Petunia smiled like it hurt her face. “Pleased to meet you.”

“You as well,” Sister Silesia said. “May I help you?”

“Yes,” Uncle Vernon said gruffly. “You’re an orphanage, right?”

“That we are.”

Harry’s stomach plummeted somewhere around his toes. No. They couldn’t—wouldn’t abandon him. Would they?

He was _family_. Snakes didn’t care so much about blood family but they all said landplodders—humans—did. Family was supposed to look out for each other. He’d never run away ‘cause as bad as Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon and Dudley were, strangers had to be worse.

“This is my late sister’s child,” Aunt Petunia said stiffly. She hadn’t let go of Harry’s shoulder. He couldn’t do more than squirm a little with how tightly she was pinning him to the chair. Like she could tell he wanted to bolt. “She and her husband died in a car accident when the boy was a year old. We’re the only relatives but we have a son of our own, and looking after both of them…”

 _Dudley’s not so fat he needs another bedroom_ , Harry wanted to say. _And I barely eat anything._

Saying things like that only ever got him hit by Uncle Vernon, though, so he didn’t.

“I understand,” Sister Silesia said gently. “What’s your name, dear boy?”

Harry peered at her from under his unruly black hair.

“Answer her, boy,” Aunt Petunia hissed, her fingers digging in tighter.

“Harry Potter, ma’am,” he said quietly.

“So polite,” Sister Silesia said. “I’m sorry you can’t look after him any longer but I appreciate that you’ve taken the time to raise the boy right…”

Uncle Vernon snorted. “Not that he made it easy, mind. He’s an odd one.”

“How so?”

“Well… too _quiet_ ,” Vernon said.

Aunt Petunia sighed. “Our son is a darling boy, so friendly and sweet, he has ever so many friends… but they all say this one is strange and creepy. He has a very difficult time with other children.”

Harry tried not to scowl at his feet. He’d got pretty good at pretending not to be mad because Uncle Vernon yelled at him for it but still. It wasn’t _his_ fault he had no friends. Other children were just stupid and messy and brutish. Hessa had taught him that word, _brutish_. He liked it a lot.

“I’m sure we can help him with that. We have plenty of children here,” Sister Silesia said brightly. “How about it, Harry? Would you like to stay here with other children? Make some friends?”

He looked up at her again, then at Aunt Petunia. No, he didn’t, because if nothing else he knew Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon. He knew how to deal with them and how to cause the least problems. He knew what they expected, and their routines, and how to stay out of the way. There’d be a whole new set of rules here, new people, and—what if he had to share a room? His cupboard was tiny and cramped and smelly and spidery but it was _his_. Dudley never came into the cupboard.

But Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon were wearing their ‘dead set’ faces. They weren’t going to change their minds.

“Yes, ma’am,” he said quietly.

Sister Silesia smiled gently. Her face was wrinkly like old, thin paper. He bet her hair would be silver if it wasn’t covered by the weird white-trimmed black hood thing. “Wonderful. I’m sure you’ll love it here. The Sisters of Saint Hedwig are dedicated to providing the best possible life for children who have nowhere else to go, especially in light of the conditions of the state foster care system…”

“Appalling system,” Aunt Petunia sniffed. “They don’t even give preference to proper churchgoing families, can you imagine?”

Sister Silesia nodded. “Truly unfortunate. We take in as many as possible. You’ll find many other children like yourself here, Harry.”

“There’s paperwork, I expect?” Uncle Vernon grunted.

“Of course. I’ll find Sister Mariette, she usually handles such things. If you’ll come with me, we can find one of the other children to show young Harry around, and then return him to my office so you can say good-bye.”

 

Two hours later, Harry stood on the front porch with Sister Silesia and the boy from before, whose name was Charlie McCain. The Dursleys’ tail lights pulled away down the driveway.

Maybe humans and snakes were more similar than he’d thought.

“Well, Harry,” Sister Silesia said. “I’ll turn you over to Charlie now, shall I? Charlie, Sister Agnes said to put him in room 203 with Mark for now. Harry, breakfast will be in the dining hall tomorrow morning at seven thirty. Please don’t be late. Tonight you can borrow pajamas—Charlie, can you ask around and get him a clean set of spares?—and then, tomorrow, Sister Elisabeth can take you shopping.”

“Shopping?” Harry said. He’d never been shopping. He just wore Dudley’s old things.

“Well, yes,” Sister Silesia said, blinking. “You need more clothes! We get a bit of money from the government to outfit each of our wards. Good night, dears.”

Harry was left staring at Charlie.

“How old’re you?” said Charlie.

“Five.”

“I’m eight. So I get to tell you what to do,” Charlie said.

Harry frowned. “That’s not how it works.”

“Yes it is. And anyway, I’m friends with Fletcher, and he’s ten and in charge around here, so there.” Charlie wiped his nose on his sleeve.

So these children didn’t seem any nicer or less gross than Dudley’s friends. Awesome.

“Okay,” Harry said. Fighting back directly never helped against Dudley and his friends. It just made them madder. Better to pretend he agreed now and then do what he wanted later. “Do we get dinner?”

“Yeah, but I’ll just get us some from the kitchens and send you up. You’ve missed it,” Charlie said with a mean smile.

It was decided. Harry didn’t like him.

 

He didn’t let the tears fall until very late that night, when he was sure his roommate Mark was sound asleep.

 

**August 19, 1984**

Having clothes that fit was a weird feeling. Harry picked at his new pants as he and Sister Elisabeth left the secondhand clothing store. They got everything used to stretch the money farther. He felt like there should be more fabric there, more like Dudley’s oversize old pants. At least these trainers didn’t hurt his feet as much as Piers’ old shoes did.

Sister Elisabeth kept up a running stream of commentary all day. Her voice was kind of annoying and most of what she said he didn’t understand, although he got the general sense that she wasn’t fond of the government or of children. She must have been pretty stupid if she didn’t like the government or kids and still went to work in an orphanage that got money from the government. Still, it was nice not having to make conversation. Harry didn’t get why so many people seemed uncomfortable in silence, but he never knew what to say to fill it, so they just got uncomfortable around him. Silence didn’t dare make an appearance around Sister Elisabeth.

He only braved asking questions once, on the bus back to Ashleworth, the closest town to Saint Hedwig’s. By that point he was pretty sure that Sister Elisabeth liked talking so much she would just answer rather than make fun of him for not knowing something. “Why are you and the other ladies called Sister?”

“It’s a religious thing,” Sister Elisabeth said. “Do you know what religion is, Harry?”

“I know it’s church,” he said. “Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon never used to take me.”

“Why ever not?”

“They said I didn’t belong in churches.”

Sister Elisabeth blinked. “That’s strange. I wonder why they sent you to a Catholic orphanage, then. I’ll ask Sister Silesia. Anyway, we’re called nuns—dedicated to God. We wear these headdresses—they’re called wimples—as a sign of our faith, and we’ll never marry. Our sect follows the Catholic Saint Hedwig in honor of her seven children and compassion. Nuns all go by “Sister,” and we’re not generic nuns, but we still use the title.”

“Oh. What’s church like?”

“You’ll see next Sunday. The little chapel in the backyard is for the Sisters’ worship every day but on Sundays, the whole orphanage walks down to the church in Hartpury together for Mass.”

“What’s Mass?’

And Sister Elisabeth was off, talking about God and Jesus and sermons and pastors and redemption. Harry listened with half an ear and clutched his paper bags of clothes tighter. _His_ clothes. Bought for him.

He couldn’t remember having things that were _his_ before.

 

**February 17, 1985**

Life at the orphanage was different.

For the most part, Harry liked being allowed to do as he pleased. He skipped lunch most days, spending loads of time walking around the fields and farms around Nup End, White End, Ashleworth, Longridge End, and Hartpury. All of them were little towns within walking distance of Saint Hedwig’s. Hartpury was the biggest but his favorite was tiny Ashleworth because they had a library. Some old nobleman had died and left his entire collection of books to the town, and none of them was allowed to leave the building, so Harry spent a lot of time holed up in there. Elroy Byrnes ran the library and he was the crustiest, grouchiest old man Harry had ever met, but he didn’t mind letting Harry stay as long as Harry was nice to the books. They passed loads of time sitting together in silence.

He wandered when he wasn’t in the library. There were plenty of snakes in the English countryside and Harry missed his snakes from Surrey but he made more alliances with the ones here. Merinn, Lissavassa, and Weversee were his favorites.

The snakes were a bit of a problem, though. One of the older boys, Malcolm Hecke, had seen Harry holding Lissavassa one day, and told Fletcher. Harry woke up to a fist in his stomach that night. His roommate, Mark, just huddled in his bed with wide eyes, and watched. Malcolm and Fletcher and Charlie and Amos left him bloody and bruised. They said it was ‘cause snakes were the Devil’s animal but Harry thought they just wanted an excuse to hurt him.

Really, there were only two things he hated about the orphanage, but those two things were big parts of it.

Harry slid a little farther down in his pew. It was Sunday Mass, and the incense only made him sleepy. Pastor March droned on and on up by the altar. Mylie Atwater and Tommy Crisp sat on either side of him. They were both wide-eyed and attentive. Harry hated it. Mylie and Tommy were his only friends so far and he liked them well enough but he disagreed with them about _this_.

Church was boring. Mostly, though, he hated it because it hated snakes. The snakes were Harry’s only real allies, and the only people in his life he was confident wouldn’t turn on him, ‘cause he provided them something and they provided him something, so they all stuck together. People were way harder and way more likely to just suddenly up and hate you for no reason. But religion hated on _snakes_ , and also on people who didn’t seem to deserve it. Harry had been lying and stealing his whole life, but Pastor March and the Sisters said lying and stealing would send you to Hell. Plus, the snake in the Book of Genesis had wanted Eve and Adam to learn things. Harry would always rather know about the bad people in the world, like the kidnappers he’d been reading about last week, than not. Even if the knowledge was scary and made him jumpier around strangers than he had been.

He didn’t say any of that, though. The Sisters only really got mad when one of the kids started complaining about Mass or making fun of the Bible. Harry wasn’t stupid. Even Mylie and Tommy didn’t know how much he hated coming to Mass.

Finally, Pastor March finished his sermon. Harry opened his book. It had been Fletcher’s, before Harry lifted it from the older boy’s bag in revenge for pushing him down the stairs last week. Harry had very carefully cut the cover off a Bible with one of the older boys’ razors, and then pasted it on over Fletcher’s book, so now he could hold it at an angle and look like a good Catholic boy reading the Bible in church. He smirked whenever he thought about how he was fooling the nuns. And Tommy and Mylie were too busy watching everything going on to notice it wasn’t actually a Bible.

 They left church in a group. Harry and Mylie and Tommy usually ended up in the back together when Saint Hedwig’s walked places but after Mass they always elbowed their way up front to ask the Sisters questions about the sermon, so Harry was on his own behind the other kids, kicking a rock down the road.

Until Malcolm and Lisa shoved him into a ditch full of freezing, muddy water.

Harry came up sputtering and choking on water. Sister Silesia and Sister Marietta and Sister Rachel hauled him out and scolded him for being careless while Malcolm and Lisa told Fletcher’s gang what happened.

All the way back, Harry shivered and stiffened his shoulders against their mocking jeers. The whole orphanage was laughing at him. Even Mylie and Tommy had to hide smiles at some of the jokes made about stupid clumsy Harry.

“No wonder your aunt ‘n uncle didn’t want you,” Charlie laughed. “Who’d want a clumsy lump like you around?”

Harry looked around. The Sisters were talking up at the front of the group. So he grabbed hold of his freakishness and concentrated really, really hard. The feeling surged under his skin and then Mark was on the ground, howling in pain at a twisted ankle.

Mylie and Tommy stared at Harry with wide eyes. Everyone else hurried over to Mark. After all, Harry hadn’t touched him, so they all just thought he’d tripped. Mark then got teased the rest of the way back and Harry was mostly left alone. It was fair, after all; Mark hadn’t done anything to stop Fletcher’s crowd from coming into their room and leaving Harry bloody.

“Did you do that?” Tommy asked. “You were like, staring at Mark all creepy before he fell…”

“How could I have done that?” Harry said.

“I dunno.” Tommy shifted his feet. “They were talking about witchcraft last week in Mass, like moving things without touching them…”

Harry snorted. “Witches are women, Tommy. I’m a boy.”

Tommy and Mylie laughed then. They still looked a little nervous. Harry’s heart pounded and he’d never lied harder in his life.

Was that what he was? A witch? The sisters all talked about witchcraft and evil and “congress with the Devil” and  stuff but the only actual witches he’d heard of were women. Women in black pointy hats on broomsticks. All of that sounded weird and implausible, but even if witches were real, Harry didn’t think he was one. Men could have “congress with the Devil” too, but he was pretty sure he’d never met the Devil.

They also described some bad people as having the Devil in them. Harry thought Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia had the Devil in them. Possibly also Dudley, except he was more his parents’ fault. Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were the worst people he knew. But they went to church and didn’t burn up. Unless they were faking.

It was all really confusing.

 

**April 8, 1986**

“I can’t wait to go to school!”

Mylie squinted at him. “You’re weird.”

Harry shrugged to hide his anger. _Weird_ was better than _freak_.

“Why are you starting primary with us, anyway?” Tommy said. “We’re both a year younger than you.”

“I’m little for my age,” Harry said. “They held me back so I could adjust. I should’ve started last year but…” He shrugged again.

“You’ll kick all our butts,” Mylie said. “With how much you read.”

Harry grinned and opened his book, a children’s copy of _A Midsummer Night’s Dream_. He’d seen Sister Laura’s _Midsummer Night’s Dream_ but he hadn’t been able to understand it, so she pointed him toward the very battered one done in normal English. He’d loved how the real version looked on the page, and couldn’t wait until he was old enough to read it properly. 

“I dunno why you read so much,” Tommy sighed. “It’s so boring.”

“It’s _interesting_.”

Tommy shrugged and threw grass at Mylie. She shrieked and tackled him. Harry ignored their roughhousing and turned the page.

“Hey, freak! Oh look, the freak and his friends!”

Harry looked up, but he was too late.

Charlie and Fletcher and Amos were looming over them, and Harry could see two others running over, probably Malcolm and Lisa. His hands felt cold. He’d thought this random dirty corner of the yard would be forgotten and they could hide here but _noooo_.

“What’s the freak got, huh?” Charlie snatched the book. “Think you’re too good for us, huh, _freak_? Think you can pretend to be better just by reading?”

He _was_ better, and not just because he was way _smarter_ than Charlie, but still. Harry stayed quiet, crouched in the dirt where he’d stopped halfway to his feet, watchful. Tommy and Mylie were hovering uncertainly off to the side.

Fletcher laughed. “Oooh, such a baby, reading about fairies and princesses! Are you a poof, Potter?”

“Give it back, please,” Harry said quietly.

They only laughed harder. And yeah, that was Malcolm and Lisa rejoining the group, already smiling. “Give it back, he says! Give it back!” Fletcher shook the book at Harry. “Nah, you know what? I don’t think I will. I think—I’ll just—do _this.”_

He tore the cover off the book and dropped it.

Harry didn’t pick it up. Didn’t move. Or look at the cover. He was too busy staring at Fletcher.

He didn’t look away as Fletcher and his cronies laughingly tore the book apart. It seemed to make the older boy uncomfortable so Harry cocked his head just slightly. Kept staring. Mylie was crying a little and Tommy kept making weak protests that went ignored.

“Look at the little freak,” Fletcher finally snapped. “Won’t stop staring at me. I think we broke him, guys!”

“Broken! Broken!” Lisa taunted, chucking a rock at him. It bounced off Harry’s cheek and he flinched a little but still he didn’t look away at Fletcher. And now he was picturing Fletcher and Lisa as the weak ones, as the one on the ground, was picturing all of them in his place. Blood on their faces like on Harry’s when Dudley used to beat him up or Charlie knocked him into a wall.

Malcolm kicked him in the ribs. “Get up, freak! Get up!”

Harry held his torso and tried to breathe. That _hurt_. Every movement made the pain spike again but he forced himself upright.

“Sad,” Amos said, laughing, and then he reached out.

The second he touched Harry’s shoulder, the world flickered.

Harry blinked and somehow he was on his hands and knees, breathing hard. Pain thrummed in his ribs with every heave. Pain and something else.

He looked up. Amos, Malcolm, Fletcher, Lisa, and Charlie were all sprawled out on the dirt, groaning and rolling and trying to get up.

Blink. Why wasn’t his brain working at usual speed?

“Harry,” Tommy said. “Harry, what just… did you do that?”

“Freak,” Amos choked out, and then Charlie said “ _witch!”_ and ran.

The others followed.

Harry tried to get up. He was bone tired. The world was spinning a little and he really just wanted to go lie down.

“Did you do that?”

Harry stumbled and reached out for Tommy’s shoulder.

Tommy jerked back and away.

That was when Harry realized his friend’s eyes were huge and wet and _afraid_. Also, Mylie was gone.

“Where’s Mylie?” he said.

“She ran off. You _scared her_ ,” Tommy said. “Harry, what just happened!”

“I dunno.”

“Yes you do.” Tommy frowned. “This is like… not the first weird thing to happen around you and… oh my gosh it _is_ you. Isn’t it!”

He was too tired to lie. “Yes, all right? Sometimes things just happen! I didn’t mean to but they tore up my book and—”

Don’t cry, he told himself. Crying is showing weakness.

“Witch,” Tommy whispered. “Freak. They were right…”

His feet pounded on the dirt and he was gone, too.

Harry picked up a page of the book. It had an illustration of a man with a donkey’s head. Everyone said it was a comedy just ‘cause it ended with a wedding, and it _was_ funny, but it also had people tricking each other and a man stealing from his wife because she wouldn’t give him what he wanted. It had its creepy moments.

Slowly, he crumpled the page inside his fist.

 

The Sisters thought Harry tore up the book, and set him to a week of scrubbing dishes. He tried to tell them what really happened but Fletcher’s crowd lied and then Mylie and Tommy claimed they weren’t there and Harry got another two weeks plus a flogging done by the tree-trimmer for lying.

 

**April 13, 1986**

He’d waited until Sister Violet was asleep. She could never stay awake in her position watching at the base of the stairs. He was still in big trouble and still walking stiffly from the flogging but Sister Violet’s watch would be taken over by Sister Marietta for a week after tonight. It was his best chance.

Harry crept down the hallway and into the room Fletcher and Amos shared. They were both sound asleep.

Fletcher’s rubber ball sat on the dresser.

In three seconds, it was in Harry’s hand and he was back in the hallway. Easing the door shut and breathing hard. Fletcher took the ball with him _everywhere._

He had an hour until Sister Rachel, the best cook, was up to start breakfast. Plenty of time. Harry crept down two flights of stairs, past his own hall on the first floor, and then past Sister Violet’s snoring slumped body. The other Sisters’ rooms were all set behind their offices—most of which were dusty and cramped, except Sister Silesia’s—so he could be a little less careful as he hurried along the middle hall and made a right into the hall that led back into the dining room.

A few seconds of concentration unlocked the pantry. He had only figured out that bit of freakishness a few months ago and hadn’t had cause to use it much. The food was gross and they weren’t allowed seconds, but they fed him enough that he never got hungry enough to even want more.

Except, last night, Cammie overheard Sister Silesia telling Sister Elisabeth that the farmer down the road brought them a raspberry cobbler, and they’d be eating it after dinner the next day. Cammie talked even more than Sister Elisabeth. The other kids either made fun of Harry, beat him up, or left him alone, but Cammie would sometimes actually talk, if only to spread gossip. He’d gotten the pie story out of her and felt a lightbulb go off in his head.

And there was the pie, wrapped in foil and sitting on a high shelf in the back of the pantry. Harry had to climb the shelves to get it down but he was a bit small for his age and it was easy. Sister Rachel said his aunt and uncle hadn’t fed him enough for him to grow normally but he would hit a growth spurt soon.

  Before he left, Harry put the ball on the ground. Off to one side like it had been dropped and forgotten. Still in sight. He looked at it for a few seconds, moved it forward and backward, before deciding it was good enough and he should go.

 

He woke up with a start. Why was he so jumpy—

Oh, right. Pie thievery.

Harry had stuffed himself with half the pie last night and hidden the rest under a loose floorboard he was sure the Sisters didn’t know about. (Sure, because he’d taken Michael’s pocketknife and hidden it there, and when the Sisters did a room check, they hadn’t gone for the hidden spot.)

Fletcher and Amos weren’t at breakfast.

Harry smiled into his porridge. Sitting alone could be lonely sometimes… but he was getting used to it. And on mornings like this, it was funny to eat and make his face blank and watch everyone else guess wildly about how Fletcher and Amos stole the pie.

The two boys ended up with two weeks of cleaning Farmer Jacob’s chicken coop in the afternoon as punishment.

 

**May 3, 1986**

“Quit staring at me,” Harry muttered.

Mark ducked his head. “Sorry.”

Only now he was still staring, he was just doing it from the corner of his eyes.

Harry tried to read _4000 Things You Should Know_ but he couldn’t focus with the way Mark was creepily side-eyeing him. Turning around wouldn’t help, which he knew from experience. He’d still _know_ the kid was staring.

Five minutes ticked by.

Harry shut the book with a _snap_. Mark flinched. “Why are you staring at me?”

“I wasn’t.”

“Yes, you _were_ ,” Harry snapped. “I _saw you_.”

Mark’s brownish eyes were wide and afraid. Like Tommy’s had the day in the back corner of the yard. Harry was the only one back there; Tommy and Mylie had befriended Olga and didn’t talk to him anymore. It was kind of weird having another kid be afraid of _him_. Mark was a year older!

“I—I…”

Harry rolled his eyes. “You think I’m a witch or something.”

Mark flinched again.

Harry studied his roommate. Arguing never worked. Explaining how stupid that was never worked. They’d all been calling him that and attacking him in groups from behind ever since The Incident no matter how much he protested that he’d never gone and sold his soul to the Devil for powers or anything. He was pretty sure it wouldn’t convince Mark now, either.

“Then ask for a different room,” Harry said.

“What?”

“It’s not hard,” Harry hissed. Mark scooted back on his bed. “Talk to one of the Sisters. Ask for another room.”

“But… they’d want a reason.”

Was he really supposed to spend his whole childhood around idiots like this? “Say you’d rather room with your friends. Say I snore and you can’t sleep. I don’t care.”

 

**May 6, 1986**

Mark moved out.

 

**May 17, 1986**

They gave him a new roommate, a four-year-old named Ryan. Harry terrified the kid into leaving him alone. Ryan spent almost no time in their room except to sleep, which suited them both fine.

 

**June 27, 1986**

Ryan got adopted. Harry made a few comments to Sister Rachel, who watched him unhappily the whole time, and he wasn’t assigned a new roommate.

 

**October 16, 1986**

School was weird.

He liked the library. He liked the yellow school bus, because if he sat up front by the driver, he could read and the other kids left him alone. He liked getting better at reading and writing, and learning basic maths (numbers never pretended to be something they weren’t). He liked that the other kids couldn’t do much more than throw spitballs at his back or whisper _freak_ walking by his desk or the teachers would scold them for being unruly.

He _didn’t_ like the teachers, or the other students. The teachers seemed blind to things going on under their noses, like the constant war of stealing Harry’s books or picking on the local kids he tried to befriend. It wasn’t long before no one at school would talk to him just like none of the Saint Hedwig’s kids would talk to him and none of them noticed. Also, the other students just confirmed what he’d seen around Dudley and Saint Hedwig’s. Kids were stupid, and messy, and annoying, and Harry didn’t know _why_ he was different. Only that he was and they couldn’t forgive him for it.

At least none of the teachers seemed to think he was a witch or a devil. Only shy.

 

**December 27, 1986**

Zeke Taylor walked into breakfast wearing Harry’s shoes.

Harry paused with a spoon of porridge halfway to his mouth, then kept eating like nothing was wrong. His new trainers, which the Sisters had gotten as a Christmas gift since his old pair were falling apart and way too small. His new trainers, which had gone missing the day before.

Zeke was ten years old. He was a little small for his age or Harry’s shoes wouldn’t have fit him. Plus, the Sisters bought them big so Harry would have room to grow. He looked very proud of himself.

After breakfast, Harry went outside. Zeke and his friends, Yuri and Benjamin, liked to con cigarettes off the older boys sometimes and smoke them under the trees that bordered Old Man Parrish’s property out back. It was a nice and quiet spot, out of sight of the building, with several bushes conveniently placed for hiding.

Zeke arrived about an hour after breakfast. He was the first.  

Harry took a deep breath. He’d been practicing but this was still going to be really hard.

He jumped out and tackled Zeke at the waist. The older boy hadn’t been expecting Harry to be hiding in the bushes and went down with a yell. Harry narrowed his eyes and thought really hard and Zeke yelled louder when he realized he couldn’t move even though Harry had rolled off of him.

“Shut up,” Harry said angrily.

Zeke shut up. “Freak!” he hissed. “Witch!”

“For the last time, idiot, I’m a boy, and witches are girls,” Harry said, bending down. He yanked his shoes off Zeke’s feet and tied the laces together and hung them over his shoulder.

Then he looked up and studied his enemy.

 _“He is down but he is not afraid yet,”_ Merinn said from somewhere off to the left. _“I can smell his feelings. There is more anger than fear. It must be the other way around, hatchling, or he will try to hurt you more later.”_

Harry couldn’t respond here with Zeke watching but he studied the older boy and he thought Merinn was right.

“What’re you looking at, freak?” Zeke demanded. “You’ve got your bloody shoes back, haven’t you? Let me go!”

How could he frighten a ten-year-old?

Harry looked down at the bottoms of Zeke’s feet, covered only by wool socks. He grinned and bent down again and tugged the socks off.

“What the bloody heck are you doing you stupid freakish loser, just leave me alone—”

They called him _stupid_ , and _freak_ , and _loser_ and _fag_ and _weirdo_ and _creep_ and more at school all the time. It didn’t really bother Harry anymore. He ignored Zeke and concentrated again and flicked his fingers for dramatic effect.

Zeke’s insults turned into a yell of pain.

“Shhhh,” Harry said, raising a finger to his lips. Zeke choked off his yell and switched to ugly sobbing. Snot ran down his nose. Harry smiled a little. It was nice to be the one on top, for once.

He sat back and examined the single bleeding toe-to-heel cut on the bottom of each of Zeke’s feet. They were pretty shallow. Still a little deeper than he’d meant, maybe, but whatever. If it worked, it worked.

“Don’t touch my stuff,” he said.

Then he let Zeke go.

Zeke heaved back and scrambled away from Harry. He nodded jerkily. “Yeah, okay, I won’t—just don’t—just leave me alone—”

 _“Make sure he will not tell,”_ Merinn said.

“If you tell anyone about this, I’ll know,” Harry said sweetly.

Zeke nodded again. He couldn’t seem to stop. “Yeah, no, I won’t say anything, just go…”

 

Harry collapsed on his bed. He’d never used so much freakishness on purpose all at once. His arms and legs felt like jelly and his head hurt.

 _“You did well, hatchling_ ,” Lissavassa said. _“He won’t hurt you anymore.”_

 _“I know,”_ Harry said. _“I know.”_

 

**June 14, 1986**

His teachers thought he should be moved up a year.

Harry kicked his feet against the carpet in the lobby. Miss Wedderburn, Miss Preschauer,  and Mr. Peterson were all in with Headmistress Ross. Harry was busy doing what he usually did in school other than read and do classwork: watch.

It was a fun way to try and figure people out. He really didn’t like most of his classmates, and tolerated a few of the quieter ones. Watching them was useful, though, because he figured out how to fake being sorry, being sad, being thankful, being innocent, being kind. So far he hadn’t gotten very good at any of those except looking innocent but that was what practice was for. It hadn’t been hard to convince his teachers he was smart and quiet and just a little bit odd. They hadn’t heard the rumors of _freak_ and _witch_ yet.

 

**June 18, 1987**

“They bumped me up a grade,” Harry said happily.

“Good for you,” Elroy Byrnes grunted. “No more talking.”

His grumpiness didn’t bother Harry, who was used to it. Mr. Byrnes didn’t give two figs about Harry and the feeling was mutual. But he’d wanted to tell _someone_.

Now that it was summer again, he could come to the Ashleworth library as much as he wanted. Summer was great.

His bookmark was still in the book he’d been reading last week. Harry paused and ran his fingers over the worn paper. _Jarred Jigger_ , it read, the telephone number long since smeared but still legible. He still hadn’t called it, and never would—but someone had been kind to him once and he liked the reminder.

There was at least one human being who wasn’t stupid and unobservant.

 

**November 30, 1987**

Lissavassa’s corpse trembled.

No, wait, that was Harry’s hands shaking.

He’d been careless, and Maxine had seen him talking to the snake, and then she and Charlie attacked, and then they’d run off, and now they were probably telling the Sisters they’d seen freaky quiet staring Harry Potter talking to a snake but _he didn’t care._

Lissavassa was his ally and now she was dead.

 

The Sisters set him to spending an hour in the chapel every morning for a month to think on his wickedness. Even Sister Silesia looked sad when she looked at him and she’d always been the nicest. But Harry didn’t care.

 

**December 6, 1987**

Maxine’s screams woke the entire orphanage.

Her roommate Alice told everyone in a hushed voice over breakfast that Maxine’s cat had been hanging upside down, its tail nailed to the wall and its neck broken, above Maxine’s bed. Everyone looked unsneakily at Harry.

 

**February 15, 1988**

Pastor March always asked Harry to hang back after Mass now. It had been going on since Christmas. Harry was pretty sure it was on purpose and he was always on his best behavior. Especially because Sister Rachel and Sister Violet were always watching him after and during Mass, and one of them always hurried back into the church after Harry finished with whatever Pastor March used to hold him back that week.

This time the pretense was talking to a stranger.

“My name is Mr. White,” the stranger said gently. Harry put on his best perfect-student face. You should always be wary of kind strangers. Kindness meant they wanted something or were hiding something or both.

“Harry Potter,” he said. “Pleased to meet you, sir.”

Mr. White nodded gravely. “Very good. I always like seeing such well-mannered children.”

He didn’t say anything else. Harry sat quietly and didn’t fidget and clung to the perfect-student look. Something about this man made him really, really nervous. Enough for his palms to get sweaty.

“Do you know why I’m here?” Mr. White said.

“No, sir,” Harry said truthfully.

He nodded slowly. “I’m a social worker, Mr. Potter. Do you know what that means?”

“You work with the government,” Harry said. “For kids who don’t have parents.”

“Indeed. I’m here to speak with you about some rumors we’ve heard.”

Harry’s heart pounded. Something about this felt wrong. If Mr. White was with the government then why was he meeting Harry in the church and not Saint Hedwig’s? Also, why Harry? Did they know he was a freak? Had someone seen him—

No, Mylie and Tommy were too frightened to tell. Zeke, too. Fletcher’s crew had a reputation for troublemaking at school and in Saint Hedwig’s so anything _they_ said would be questioned. Mr. White had rumors. Nothing else.

“Like what?” he said.

“Well… of strange things happening.” Mr. White frowned. “You understand we don’t want to just… believe in such fantastical stories. But when we hear enough of them—well. We have to investigate, as a matter of protocol.”

“I haven’t seen anything strange.” Harry knew he’d said too fast as soon as the words were out of his mouth. Mr. White sat up a little straighter. Pastor March stopped even pretending to not listen.

“Nothing?” Mr. White pressed.

Harry was silent.

“We’re here to help, young man.” Mr. White’s voice was kind, and inviting, and everything adults never were to Harry unless he fooled them first. “If there’s anything out of the ordinary happening around children, it can hurt those children. We have to make sure they’re safe.”

No. No, if he was sure of nothing else, his freakishness was part of him he would never give up. Harry shrank back a little. “I haven’t seen anything, sir.”

 

He broke into Sister Silesia’s office that night. There was a Mr. Leon White listed in her files as a social worker contact with the government. He also used to work as a pastor in northern England. Weirdly, all the other social workers were listed with the Child Maintenance Commission, but Mr. White didn’t have anything by his name.

Weird.

 

**October 3, 1988**

“You sure like reading, don’t you?”

Harry blushed and looked down at his hands and wished adults wouldn’t ask such stupid questions.

The substitute winked at him. “One minute, Mr. Potter.”

The rest of the class filed out for recess, ignoring Harry as usual.

“Have a look at this.”

At first he thought the pamphlet was another one of those shiny brightly-colored feel-good promotional things, but then he started really reading. About a scholarship school and Six Plus exams and financial aid and he was seven now, that was old enough to start thinking about secondary school and after that university if he ever wanted to get out of here, and this place looked like a good place to start. Even better, it was a _boarding school._ With _single rooms_. For nine months out of the year, he could escape Saint Hedwig’s.

“Thought you might be interested,” the substitute said with another warm smile. “They let you in at twelve so I’d start looking now, even if it’s a bit far off. You’re what, seven?”

“Eight, ma’am,” he said softly.

“Best of luck, young man.”

Mr. Lars, the librarian, gave him battered and ripped prep books for the Six Plus exam, and showed him things that would help get ready for the school’s entrance exams. He did all of it with an air of suspicion like he thought Harry would never do it, or stay interested. Harry didn’t care.

They all thought he was pathetic, a freak, a loser, a creep. And he might be creepy to them, he might be a freak, but he wasn’t a loser or pathetic and his freakishness was a part of him. Harry was going to go somewhere and do something and prove them all wrong.

He checked out four of the books.

 

**October 8, 1988**

“Nerd,” Anna Woodhouse laughed.

Harry ducked his head. Here, in a school hallway full of kids sneaking glances and swallowing smiles, he couldn’t do anything with the energy sparking under his skin. Couldn’t do anything except let Amos shove him into a wall, and nurse his bruises.

“Like _he’d_ do well,” Fletcher agreed. “Little freak that he is. His own _family_ didn’t want him!”

“His freakiness probably scared ‘em off,” Malcolm said. “Woo, Potter’s out to get you! Wooo!”

“And he’s never even been _adopted_ ,” Lisa sneered.

“Neither have _you_ ,” Harry said.

“Freak,” she spat.

“Move along, kids, move along, it’s lunchtime,” Headmistress Ross said. The little gang broke up and the older kids moved off, laughing.

“How are you, Harry?” Headmistress Ross said absently, flipping through paperwork.

He straightened and smiled like his back wasn’t killing him. “Good, thank you.”

“Glad to hear it. Hurry up, now, or you’ll miss lunch.”

 _Stupid old hag_. “Thank you, Headmistress.”

 

When Lisa and Anna collapsed, screaming about ants in their eyes, Harry was in the cafeteria with them but sitting on the opposite side.

Only Mark and Charlie thought to look over at Harry in the corner. His ex-roommate and his old nemesis both flinched away.

Harry went back to his corned beef sandwich. He hadn’t known exactly what his freakishness was going to do, only that he wanted to hurt them and wanted them gone for a while. Based on what the school matron said as she helped the teachers carry the girls out, they should be gone for at least a few days.

 

**October 20, 1988**

Lisa finally came back to Saint Hedwig’s but she wasn’t the same as before. She barely talked and twitched when people shouted too loudly and she had a deathly fear of ants.

Harry only heard the rumors from Cammie on the school bus, and didn’t see Lisa until lunch. She sat near the supervisor’s desk with Anna. They ate very little and didn’t talk. Half the school seemed to be staring at them.

Once his lunch was finished, Harry stood up and walked over. He was small and he was good at using body language to go unnoticed, so Lisa and Anna didn’t spot him until he slid into a seat across their table.

Both went pale.

“Hi,” he said with a little smile. His back was to the supervisor’s table and the noise of the cafeteria covered his words. “How are you feeling?”

Lisa’s mouth worked but no words came out.

“Like tormenting me any more?” Harry continued, just as softly.

Anna shook her head violently.

A hand landed on Harry’s shoulder. “Harry, dear, I think they’re a bit nervous,” Miss Preschauer said. She bent down and smiled warmly at Anna and Lisa. “Girls, are you sure you wouldn’t like to eat somewhere else?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Lisa whispered. “We’re sure.”

 “I just wanted to make sure they were all right,” Harry said, looking down and hunching his shoulders. “I didn’t mean…”

“You’re a sweet boy, Harry,” Miss Preschauer said. “Run along, now, I think Mr. Lars has a new book in today.”

“Thanks, Miss Preschauer,” he said, grinning hugely.

 

**November 22, 1989**

“Who are _you?”_

Harry stared at the kid who’d caught him stealing. The kid stared back. It was one of the younger set, the six-and-unders, who did their own thing and either left the older kids alone or got picked on by them. Harry had scared off a few of them that tried to talk to him and never bothered to learn their names. “Fletcher,” he said. “Who are _you?”_

“Christian.” No lie in the kid’s face. Idiot, just giving off his real name like that. “Are you stealing?”

Slowly, Harry reached out and snagged a loaf of bread off one shelf. He already had two apples and a bag of beef jerky in his other hand. When the kid didn’t say anything, Harry tossed him another loaf.

Christian caught it reflexively.

“Whoops,” Harry said, stepping forward. “Move,” he added, putting freakishness into his voice, and Christian obeyed like they always did. The kid’s eyes blew wide. “Now you’re stealing too.”

Christian squeaked. “But… why?”

“Aren’t you still hungry after dinner?” Harry had thought the food was enough, once, but he was growing and he was always hungry lately.

“Yes…”

“That’s why.”

“My Mum said stealing’s wrong.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Your mum’s dead, or you wouldn’t be here. And who cares about wrong?” He took a bite of his apple to make the point and pulled the pantry shut, willing it to lock itself again.

“You’re the one they said got Tommy’s hair on fire. And put Sam in the hospital.”

“How could I have caught Tommy’s hair on fire?” Harry said. _Easily_ , he thought with a smirk, remembering his ex-friend’s face when he’d cut off midway through calling Harry a fag and started screaming at the heat. His scalp was still bald and red. “And I never touched Sam.” He hadn’t had to, although the coma thing was unintentional. Harry actually had no clue what his freakishness had done to Sam or when the other boy would wake up. If at all. Lisa and Anna had never really recovered from the ants thing.

“Oh.” Christian shuffled. “But they called you a freak.”

Harry glanced over his shoulder and grinned. “They weren’t wrong about _that_.” Then he bared his teeth and thought about snakes and hissed, _“My cousin looked like a pig in a wig.”_

Christian flinched and fled, the loaf of bread still in his hand.

 

**June 23, 1991**

If they’d asked, Harry would have preferred to stay at Saint Hedwig’s. But no, they _all_ had to go to the London Zoo for the field trip. No exceptions.

Between spitballs landing in his hair and the constant headache-causing noise of the other Saint Hedwig’s wards, Harry was in a foul mood by the time the bus pulled into the parking lot. The Sisters filed off first and he was one of the first to follow them.

Sister Rachel was in charge since Sister Silesia died last year, and she glared at Harry as he got off. She’d never liked him and the feeling was mutual. Harry glared right back and waited while the other orphans tumbled out of the bus. He didn’t bother to hide his boredom.

“Line up! Two by two, please! No, Fletcher, leave Anna’s hair—Harry, dear, won’t you stand by Tommy?—Heather, no, I’m afraid you can’t be with both Amos and Kyle in line—”

Tommy and Harry lined up next to each other, both of them glaring.

“I’m no happier about this than you, so just leave me alone and we won’t have problems,” Harry said quietly.

“Or what?” Tommy said, one hand tugging unconsciously at his beanie. The doctors said his hair would never grow back. “You’ll burn my eyes out?”

Harry grinned at him. He’d practiced this expression in the mirror like all his others. Tommy paled and leaned away from him, which was exactly the effect he’d wanted. Fear. “I might.”

Tommy swallowed and pinned his eyes between Yvette’s shoulder blades as the line started moving.

Harry nodded, satisfied. Fear was so useful. Fear was the best way to stay safe. Fear was so much better than anger or hatred or even affection.

The Sisters bought their tickets and put a plastic blue bracelet on each child’s left wrist. Harry fiddled with his. It was stiff and strong and uncomfortably difficult to take off. He’d probably need a pair of scissors later.

“Can we go see the lions?”

“And the polar bear!”

“I want to see the parrots!”

Harry shoved his hands in the pockets of his cheap used trousers. He so did not want to be here. The animals were cool but there were _far_ too many people, and he had no escape from the other kids.

“We’ll get to see everything,” Sister Violet reassured them. Sister Marietta moved down the line, counting them by twos. Her face tightened when she counted Harry. “Let’s start with the big cats, they’re just down this way…”

The Sisters gave up trying to keep them all in line. Relieved, Harry drifted over to Garrett Smithy, who’d bought a fact book about the various animals with some pocket money. He was twelve, a whole two years older than Harry, but he was also a coward. Harry grabbed the book out of his hands.

“Hey…” Garrett trailed off when he saw who’s taken the book.

Harry narrowed his eyes.

Garrett turned away without a word.

After that it was more fun. Harry followed the group in the back and read the book, learning about the animals they passed. Lions and seals and a few penguins, then parrots, then two gray wolves. The wolves might have been cooler except they were both supremely uninterested in doing anything other than dozing in the shade. Harry could relate.

Finally, they got to the place he’d been most excited about—the reptile house.

All the snakes Harry had ever met were relatively plain English varieties, with the exception of Serateri, the escaped Egyptian asp. Zoos had cool poisonous species. According to Garrett’s book, they had a king cobra, a puff adder, and a Burmese python at the moment.

He wasn’t the only one. Only repeated scoldings from the Sisters reminded the other kids to _stay quiet_ going into the Reptile House because reptiles didn’t like loud noises. The other zoo visitors were interested in reptiles too, apparently, or maybe they just wanted to get inside out of the heat. When they swarmed inside, it was already packed. Merinn and Weversee were going to love this when Harry got back and told them about the zoo snakes.

 _“Hello,”_ he hissed quietly at the Burmese python.

It lifted its head. _“Is the landplodder hatchling speaking…?”_

 _“I am,”_ Harry said.

_“How interesting. I am Ferosie.”_

_“The sign says your name is Bertha.”_

_“An idiotic landplodder name, but I abide by it because they are too stupid for me to tell them my real one.”_

Harry grinned. _“Do you like it here? Other than the name.”_

_“They feed me life prey and I am protected from the elements. It can be boring but my previous landplodder home was worse.”_

_“Do you want out?”_

_“Not particularly.”_

That was good. Merinn and Weversee had demanded that he offer the zoo snakes escape if they were unhappy and Harry had no confidence in his ability to smuggle a fourteen-foot python out of a zoo.

“DUDLEY! Look at this one!”

Someone slammed into Harry’s side. He went flying and skidded on the ground and felt his shirt and elbows tear but—

That name.

He looked up—

That boy.

Memories came back. He’d been really little but you didn’t forget sleeping in a _cupboard_ , having a frying pan hit you on the head. You didn’t forget the family who abandoned you to an orphanage. And that was Dudley, fatter and bigger than Harry remembered, attended by rat-faced Piers Polkiss and horsey Aunt Petunia and walrus-like Uncle Vernon.

His hands were trembling. Harry stuffed them in his pockets as he got to his feet, forgotten in the corner as Piers and Dudley jostled for space by the python’s enclosure. Some of the other visitors had come over, too, but none of the orphanage kids.

 _“Can you do me a favor?”_ Harry asked. Only the snake heard him.

_“What favor?”_

_“If I let you out, scare those two boys a bit, and then you can mess around if you like before the zoo people catch you again.”_

_“I would not mind a bit of freedom to explore. They won’t harm me?”_

_“You’re like fourteen feet long and the zoo people are decent from what I’ve seen.”_

The snake dripped down out of her tree and up to the glass. _“All right, then. As long as you speak to Raza—he is the puff adder, and he doesn’t like it here.”_

_“Deal.”_

Harry concentrated, leaning on the wall as freakishness left him in a rush.

The glass disappeared.

No one noticed at first. Uncle Vernon was still talking loudly at the enclosure, trying to get the snake to move.

Then someone screamed.

Ferosie lunged, moving way faster than you’d expect from a snake her size. Harry grinned. Dudley shrieked and staggered backwards. Ferosie landed next to him, lifted her head, and _hissed_ loudly. It was nothing other than a very loud demand for more rats, please, but if you didn’t speak snake then you’d never know what she said. Dudley and Petunia and half the other visitors were screaming, two zoo people in tan uniforms were shoving through the crowd, and Harry hadn’t had this much fun in a long while.

 _“Thank you, hatchling,”_ Ferosie said, dodging a zookeeper and fleeing into the crowd. People lunged away from her. One last hiss reached Harry’s ears: _“This is quite enjoyable…”_

The zookeepers started chasing everyone out of the reptile house. Harry dodged past one of them and hid in a corner until the place was empty and the keepers were off chasing Ferosie; judging by their shouts, she’d gotten into the room where they stored the live rats. All the other animals were agitated.

It took a few seconds for Harry to spot the well-camoflauged puff adder in its enclosure. “ _Raza?”_

_“Who asks?”_

_“A human hatchling. My name is Harry_ — _I have been called Potenji in your language. Ferosie said I should speak with you in exchange for a favor.”_

_“You let her out.”_

_“I did, yes. Another human hatchling was here—one who’s treated me badly. She scared him for me.”_

Raza lifted his head and examined Harry through the glass. _“You are an interesting landplodder. You offer me release?”_

_“Yes. As long as you don’t bite me.”_

_“I would not,”_ Raza said. _“We don’t bite landplodders who speak our language if they do not give us cause.”_

Harry’s stomach churned with excitement. “ _You’ve met other landplodders who can speak?”_

_“The one who kept my egg-mother and myself and my hatchmates, yes.”_

_“Can you tell me the story later?”_

_“Yes. If you let me out.”_

_“No biting anyone unless they’re trying to hurt you.”_

_“Fine.”_

Harry put a hand on the glass and willed it gone.

It took more out of him than he’d expected. He staggered a bit as Raza slithered forward. _“What now?”_

 _“Wrap around my waist, under my shirt.”_ Good thing the Sisters bought all their clothes big so they had room to grow. Harry always got made fun of in school for his secondhand oversize clothes, more so even than the other orphanage kids. This was the only time he’d ever been thankful for it. _“Stay hidden no matter what, okay? Or they’ll try to kill you and probably me.”_

Raza agreed. Harry sneaked out of the Reptile House and rejoined the rest of the group just as a frantic Sister Violet started counting again.

 

He let Raza loose as soon as they got back. _“Finally,”_ the snake hissed. _“That was absolutely horrible. We are never riding one of those things again!”_

_“What, the bus?”_

_“Yes! That abomination!”_

_“What’s with this ‘we’?”_

Raza made a sort of choppy hiss that Harry recognized as a snake’s laugh. _“You didn’t think I was leaving, did you? This is the most fun I’ve had in two years.”_

Well, great. He had to get an opinionated snake. _“If you agree to stay hidden and not bite anyone then you can stay.”_

_“Can I bite them if they hurt you?”_

Harry smirked. _“Maybe.”_

_“Excellent. Biting landplodders is fun.”_

_“I bet I’d think so, too, if I had venom and fangs.”_

_“You poor landplodder hatchling. I do not understand how your species survives so well when you are all so stupid.”_

_“Honestly? Me neither.”_

Raza started exploring Harry’s cramped room. _“You were curious about my old captor, weren’t you?”_

Harry nodded. _“He could speak to snakes, too?”_

_“Yes. He brought us here over the sea—my egg-mother told us. We hatched on the ship. This land is the only one I’ve ever known.”_

_“What happened to him?”_

_“Other landplodders caught him and kept us. They took him away and tried to kill us but my egg-mother bit one of them and we escaped. I lived near some landplodder dens for a while before one of them caught me, and then they brought me here.”_

Transporting snakes was almost definitely illegal. Especially venomous ones like this. _“You’re a puff adder, right?”_

_“That’s what they call me. I wouldn’t know. My egg-mother was not. I hatched in a fire.”_

Harry blinked. _“In… a fire?”_

_“Yes, do your ears not work?”_

_“Normal snakes don’t hatch in fires.”_

_“Well, I did.”_

That was all Raza knew. Harry let it be and set about figuring out how to keep his new snake safe and hidden from the other orphanage kids.

 

**July 31, 1991**

“Er… Potter, you—have a letter.”

Harry barely glanced up at the nervous, mousy boy. Christian had been kind of in awe of him since the pantry incident a year and a half ago. It was annoying but also useful so Harry put up with him. “Go on, then,” he said, taking the letter from Christian. The kid all but ran off.

The letter was weird—heavy and done in nice paper, and was that an actual wax seal? Harry actually stopped eating and looked at it more closely.

 

_Mr. Harrison Potter_

_Room 203, Saint Hedwig’s Orphanage_

_1844 Broad Street_

_Ashleworth, Gloucester_

That was… weirdly specific information. Harry frowned and broke the seal. Inside were two folded pieces of that same thick, heavy paper.

**Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry**

**Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore**

_(Order of Merlin, First Class; Grand Sorc.; Chief Warlock; Supreme Mugwump, International Conf. of Wizards)_

Dear Mr. Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.

Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 9 August.  

Yours sincerely,

**Minerva McGonagall**

**Deputy Headmistress**

 

Harry’s breath left him in a whoosh. For several seconds, he could not tear his eyes away from the letter.

Witchraft. Wizardry. All these years of the other students calling him a witch and— _they’d been right._

Unless this was a prank… but no, none of the other Saint Hedwig’s kids or the people at school would think to use paper like this, or an actual wax seal. Also, none of them were creative enough for this. Hogwarts, the list of titles, the names—it was all ridiculous and—it had to be real. It _had to be real._

It had to because he _couldn’t_ be the only one like him in the world.

There were others with freakishness. Other people.

It felt like the whole world had just shifted three feet to the left and everything was the same but also so impossibly different.

He wanted this. God, he wanted this.

But if he’d never heard of this place—then it was probably a secret. Based on how his fellow students and the Sisters had reacted to Harry’s freakishness over the years, it wasn’t at all surprising that freaks—witches and wizards—stayed hidden. The only problem was how was he supposed to write back? With an _owl?_

Harry frowned at the paper. He’d draft a response, and then if no other letters came within a week, he’d go to the Ashleworth post office and see if they could help.

Hogwarts. School for wizards. Reading the list of supplies, Harry’s entire chest got tight with the strength of his hunger. This was better than anything he’d ever dreamed.


	3. Chapter 3

He stood on the front walk of Number 4, Privet Drive, with trepidation in his heart.

Albus had not laid eyes on this home in just a few months shy of ten years. Nor had he seen or spoken to any of its occupants in that time. Yet the memories were as clear as if it had been yesterday.

Knocking on the door. Petunia Dursley’s look of horror at his beard. Walking inside with a bundle of squirming toddler in his arms. Vernon Dursley’s surprise that one of “you lot” knew how to dress respectfully. Explaining that he had a task to do, an evil wizard to destroy for good; that the boy was in great danger. Demurring to Muggle customs, entreating Petunia to raise her nephew as her own for his protection and for the sake of her dead sister.

He’d looked into her mind, just a light brush of passive Legilimency, and seen that her acquiescence had been grudging but genuine.

Now Albus would find out whether his plan had worked. He was confident that it had—the bonds of family were some of the strongest in existence, magical or not—but there was always a risk.

He took a deep breath and smoothed his hand over his delightfully purple robes. Coming here ten years ago, he’d worn expensive Muggle clothes to appease the Dursleys. Now, Albus wore proper robes, so he could awe and impress the boy.

Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, blessed with power the late Dark Lord knew not.

Albus had rendered the prophecy null and void, but the boy was still a threat.

Three firm knocks echoed up and down the quiet street.

Feet pounded on the other side of the door; a boy’s voice shouted that he’d get it. Albus prepared himself. The boy was born with power; the boy needed to be weak for his plans to work. Mr. Potter needed to enter Hogwarts isolated, Muggle-raised, yet healthy and generally well-adjusted. Mr. Potter needed to see Albus as mentor, protector, friend.

The door flew open.

Albus blinked. This was hopefully _not_ young Harry. This boy was obese, shiny, and remarkably similar in appearance to a pig in clothing.

The boy’s mouth opened and closed soundlessly as he gaped. Albus folded his hands in front of him and smiled. “May I come in?”

“Dudley, who’s there?” a screechier version of Petunia’s voice said.

“Some weirdo,” the boy said jeeringly.

Albus hid a frown.

Petunia appeared in the front hall, wearing a flowered apron and a pinched, unpleasant expression. Upon seeing Albus, she managed the admirable feat of becoming pale and blotchy-red at the same time. “You!”

“Me,” Albus agreed happily. Alarm bells were chiming a multi-part harmony in his head now. “May I come in?”

“No, you cannot,” Petunia hissed, hurrying down the hall. “No—I won’t have _your kind_ here, I swore that seven years ago—”

“Mum d’you know him?” Dudley said loudly.

“Pet, tell them we don’t want what they’re selling!” someone bellowed. Albus’ brows rose despite himself. Vernon sounded even less pleasant than he had during their last encounter. Then, he’d been somewhat hesitant to leave Harry here, until he saw the man’s obvious affection for his son and decided Vernon was simply on the defensive out of worry for his family.

“Leave!” Petunia demanded, looking panicked now.

“I’m merely here for the boy,” Albus said.

She became paler. The alarm bells got louder. “Young Mr. Potter?”

“Harry?” Dudley said. “What would you want _him_ for?”

Albus smiled at the boy; both he and Dudley ignored Petunia’s attempts to shield the boy behind herself. “I’m here to offer him a place at my school.”

Dudley made a face. “Well, he’s not here. Mum, I want bacon!”

Oh no. Albus felt his smile drop away as he looked from the boy to Petunia. This was—

“NOT IN MY HOUSE!”

All three of them twitched and looked at the top of the stairs.

Corpulent, red-faced Vernon Dursley lumbered down, glaring furiously at Albus, who could only think that he had been badly wrong and this was not a man to whom anyone should _ever_ entrust a child.

“Dudley, go to your room,” Petunia hissed.

“But Muuum—”

“ _Now!”_

The boy screamed and stormed but after a solid minute of back-and-forth arguing, he petulantly fled up the stairs. Vernon stood with Petunia and demanded, “What d’you want now? The freak’s gone! Your kind has no business here! Threatening good and upstanding folk—”

“Gone?” Albus said sharply. Anger and worry and the dawning realization that he’d erred, badly, left him standing tense and tall. He dropped any pretense of geniality. “Gone where? Has the boy run away?”

“Saint Hedwig’s Orphanage,” Petunia spat. “They can deal with his freakishness—Lord knows I tried but it was too much—”

“We swore we’d stamp it out of him but the insolent, ungrateful brat wouldn’t change,” Vernon snarled.

Albus had heard enough. _Stamp it out of him._ He ignored the sick twisting of his stomach, thought _legilimens_ , reached out.

It took mere seconds to blow through Petunia’s mind. A few more to slog through Vernon’s painfully narrow thinking. Albus emerged shaken to the core.

Three years of a young Harry Potter’s wild accidental magic breaking windows, shrinking oversize hand-me-down clothes, regrowing his wild hair, lashing out during beatings from Vernon. Three years of Dudley pushing him and hitting him and stealing his food while the parents did nothing, of Petunia locking the boy in a cupboard overnight or for days on end.

Albus strode past them, brushing Vernon aside with a flick of his wand, and yanked the cupboard open.

A tiny, dank space, occupied now by boots and raincoats. Not fit for a dog, much less a child—and indeed he saw a few words scratched on the wall in faded white crayon when he stuck his head inside in the wobbly and uncertain handwriting of a child.

_Harry’s Room._

Rarely did Albus feel his many years of life weigh on him but in that moment he felt each one like a stone round his neck.

Harry Potter a bit starved for affection and trust but _mostly_ healthy would have been ideal. For the boy’s sake, he couldn’t help but hope that Petunia would actually treat him as her own son, even if he’d expected and arranged for her to do a bit less. This, though—

How had he misjudged them this badly? How had he so greatly overestimated Petunia’s family loyalty?

This was exactly what he’d been trying to avoid.

 

Albus arrived at the orphanage less than an hour later.

Saint Hedwig’s had a much more cheerful façade than—another orphanage in his memory. For a moment, Albus felt hope.

He knocked on the front door and clung to that hope even in the face of the surly pinch-faced teenage girl who answered it. “Who is it?”

“My name is Professor Albus Dumbledore,” he said pleasantly. “I’m here to see a Mr. Harry Potter. Would you mind taking me to whomever is in charge?”

“This way.” The girl retreated into the home, but not before Albus saw the flicker of _something_ on her face at the mention of Harry.

“What’s your name, my dear?” he said.

The girl opened a door behind the lobby and answered without so much as turning around. “Heather.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Heather.”

She snorted rudely, knocked on another door in the back hall, and opened it. “Sister Rachel, someone’s here for you. About Potter.”

“Thank you, Heather, you may go.”

Albus stepped into the office. Of course it had to be a Catholic orphanage. He was generally fond of Muggle religions—it was so amusing how they interpreted and misinterpreted the magic in their histories—but Catholicism could be unkind to magicals, and it was occasionally difficult to convince Muggle-borns from religious households to accept their gift. “Good morning, Sister…”

“Rachel O’Riley. And you are?” The nun was elderly but still spry, with a tight smile of welcome. She almost completely hid the disapproval in her eyes as she took in Albus’ robes.

“Professor Albus Dumbledore,” he said, taking a seat opposite her. “You have a very fine institution, if I might be so bold.”

Her smile got a bit more genuine. “Yes, well, we do try. So many children are abandoned to overcrowded foster homes and such nowadays, and the Order of Saint Hedwig is dedicated to protecting as many as we can, and raising them the right way.”

“An admirable creed.”

“Thank you,” Sister Rachel said. “Heather mentioned that you’re here about Mr. Potter?”

“I am, yes.” Albus did not miss the dislike she couldn’t quite conceal. “His parents put his name down for a place in my school when he was born. It took a bit of work to track down the lad, as I’m sure you understand, but we wouldn’t want him to miss such an opportunity.”

Sister Rachel’s eyebrows almost disappeared into her wimple. “Oh? What school is this?”

“The Highmoore Institute,” Albus said, giving the cover name for Hogwarts. “I doubt you’d have heard of us—it’s a very selective and very private institution up north.”

“Is it secular?” Sister Rachel said.

He considered how far he ought to stray from the truth. “We provide opportunities for worship for students of all Judeo-Christian denominations.”

“Well enough,” she said approvingly. “Some of my Order are rather traditionalist, but I tend to take the view that we ought to be more tolerant as we progress into the new millennia. We all worship the same Lord, after all. Shall I have one of the students fetch Mr. Potter?”

“I prefer to see him in his room, if you don’t mind,” Albus said.

Sister Rachel shook her head. “The children’s rooms are their private spaces, shared only with a roommate—although Mr. Potter does not have one. Without the child’s consent, I’m afraid we cannot permit such a violation of privacy.”

Pity. Well, he could always disillusion himself and look around Harry’s room later to get a sense of the boy. “I understand. If I might ask… what is the boy like? I was a close family friend, although a tragedy in my own family required that I leave the country for a few years. By the time I returned, I couldn’t track down the child without neglecting my other responsibilities.” Below her line of sight, he flicked his wand and cast a silent, mild compulsion charm.

“He is… a clever child. Quiet,” Sister Rachel said hesitantly. “Fairly solitary. All his teachers at the local public school say he’s attentive and obedient in class, and turns in exemplary work. He… doesn’t have friends, precisely. The other children don’t seem to like him.”

“Do you _?”_ Albus said. “I find, sometimes, that the judgment of children can be rather suspect, especially when it comes to a child who does not quite fit in…”

“True.” Sister Rachel hesitated again even with the charm pressuring her to be honest and trusting. “He’s always polite. Always does as he’s told. But… odd things have happened and most of them to children he’s been fighting with.”

“Like what sort of odd things?” Albus was getting a very bad feeling and he was also forcibly remembering a very similar scene. _Disturbingly_ similar.

Sister Rachel tapped her fingers on the tabletop. “You’re taking him, yes? No matter what I say, I won’t hurt his chances of going to your school? He’ll be gone?”

She wouldn’t have even asked if not for the charm—she’d have simply demurred and dodged and refused anything more. “Assuredly,” he said. Déjà vu twisted his stomach into a shape more suited for a spring. “Nothing you say can compromise his place.”

“You know how children can be, I’m sure, as an education professional…” Sister Rachel fidgeted with the ends of her wimple. “I love them dearly under the Lord, as is proper, but they can be unkind little savages and young Harry has always been a target. We have had food thefts pinned on certain students… Two girls had nervous breakdowns a few years ago, they’ve not been the same since. And no one knows where the birds and snakes came from the one day—he swears he had nothing to do with it and I don’t know how he _could_ have—and Maxine’s cat didn’t pin _itself_ to the wall. It seems impossible but—And then there’s Pastor March. He believes the boy has the Devil in him, even called in one of the state people who look into such things, but they couldn’t find anything.”

Albus frowned. He was fairly certain the secular Muggle British government didn’t have exorcists or Devil-investigators on retainer. Perhaps this Pastor March only told the orphanage staff the investigator was from the government in order to convince them to let the investigator near the child. “Thank you, Sister, you’ve been most helpful. If I could speak with the boy?”

“Yes, of course.” Sister Rachel blinked, a bit dazed. “You may use my office. One moment, please.”

 

* * *

 

 

Harry’s hands shook as Heather led him down to Sister Rachel’s office.

In the door, he stopped, and blinked. Harry didn’t know what he’d been expecting but a tall man with a silver Gandalf beard wearing some weird version of a dress in a violent shade of purple was not it.

“Hello, Mr. Potter,” the man said kindly. Harry’s guard went up instantly. Kind adults were adults who wanted something, or who had some sort of agenda. Kind adults were people to be wary of.

“Hello, sir,” he said politely. His school teachers always liked quiet, polite, reserved children. It worked out well. He was reserved by nature.

“My name is Professor Dumbledore.”

Harry’s heart was beating very fast. “I got the letter,” he said, unable to follow his usual rule of staying quiet and letting others talk. His survival rules were important but sometimes he broke them when he had to. “From…”

“Hogwarts,” Professor Dumbledore supplied.

“So there’s others?” Harry said. If he was throwing one survival rule out the window, he might as well break the one about not showing ignorance. Normally he refused to admit ignorance, but he had far too many questions. “Others who can do things?” 

If he hadn’t spent years intensely examining everyone around him just to survive, he would’ve missed it. As it was, Harry couldn’t figure out what filtered across the professors face those words. Tiredness, maybe. It wasn’t good. Harry’s excitement died a little; had he messed up?

“What sorts of things can you do?” Professor Dumbledore asked.

Well, just because he was breaking some of his rules didn’t mean they all had to go. _Never give up all your secrets_ , Harry reminded himself. “I can make animals do what I want, sometimes,” he said. “And make things move, and warm myself up.” _Also set things on fire if I’m angry enough, or make things disappear temporarily, even if they always come back. And make people hurt, if I want them to._

“Can you show me?”

Harry picked up a pencil and frowned at it until it floated a few inches above his hand. “See? It’s not that hard.”

Professor Dumbledore’s eyes got very wide. “My boy, that is… extraordinary.”

“It is?” This was bad. Another one of the survival rules was to be as ordinary as possible outside of school. Although technically this counted as school, but still.

 “It is indeed. Most children never achieve control over their magic until they get a wand.”

Another eighty questions sprung to mind. _So it’s called magic, what I can do_. “Wands? Can I see yours? Can I buy one?”

“Yes, of course,” Professor Dumbledore said, and he drew about fifteen inches of wood out of his pocket. It wasn’t just a plain old stick, though. It was straight, with regular knobby bits marching down its length, getting smaller toward the tip, and it sat in his hand like an extension of Professor Dumbledore’s arm. Something stirred in Harry, some instinct to reach out and take it. “Young witches and wizards are permitted to purchase a wand once they turn eleven or once they accept their invitation to Hogwarts for those whose birthdays are in August.”

Harry looked at the wand and that awful, consuming hunger gripped his insides again. “Can I see some magic, please, sir?”

Professor Dumbledore smiled. It was maybe the only real smile Harry had seen from him this whole time. He pointed the wand—

An embarrassing yelp escaped him as Harry clutched the edges of his chair. It wobbled as it lifted off the ground until he was hovering two feet up in the air.

But he could do this already, even if it would exhaust him. Was this all they taught at the magic school? He already knew from normal school that teachers liked to dumb things down, a _lot_.

Still. A chance to do magic openly, to be around other people like him—people who wouldn’t call him Devil-touched, fag, monster, _freak_ —w

He summoned up an awed, impressed sort of face that made his teachers all think he’d never heard or seen anything as interesting as their latest idiocy. “Wow,” he breathed.

Professor Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. “You’d hoped for something a little more _striking,_ hm?”

Harry blushed and looked down, and it wasn’t fake. This man was harder to fool than his other teachers.

Still, he didn’t need to give up. He widened his eyes. “How much more is possible?”

“More than you can imagine, dear boy,” Professor Dumbledore said warmly.

_I doubt that._

“Now, if you’ll come with me,” Professor Dumbledore said, standing, “I can show you where people like us go to shop for purely magical things.”

 _People like us_. Harry liked the sound of that—and then he realized the professor was probably doing it on purpose. Putting him and Harry in a group to make Harry trust him. Clever. Harry got the sense Professor Dumbledore didn’t like him much, somehow. He couldn’t have said exactly what made him think that, only that he did.

Professor Dumbledore pulled out an ornate gold watch, looked at the time, and tucked it away. “I’m afraid I have other business today but a trusted associate of mine quite happily volunteered to take you shopping for your school things.” He smartly opened the office door and held it.

And… that was a problem. “Sir,” Harry faltered, with all-too-real embarrassment, “I’ve got… a bit of pocket money saved—” _stolen, technically_ —“but I don’t think it’s enough for all this.” He pulled the list of supplies out of his pocket. “Is there a—a scholarship fund, or—”

“No need for that, dear boy!” Professor Dumbledore said with a laugh that echoed down the hall. Heather, lurking near the bottom of the stairs, looked at them suspiciously. “Your parents left you more than enough to handle your school things!”

Harry stopped dead and for a second, every single one of his rules went out the window. “They _what?”_

Professor Dumbledore peered at him over his half-moon spectacles. “I’m unsure of the circumstances that led to you being raised here rather than with your aunt and uncle, but I believe I can safely assume they told you little of your parents?”

Mutely, Harry shook his head. _Give up no more information than you have to_. No need to talk about dimly remembered slurs like “whore” and “useless layabouts” and “druggies” and “freaks.”

“Your parents were a brilliant pair,” Professor Dumbledore said, guiding Harry back down the hall toward the lobby. His voice dropped so Heather couldn’t hear. “Some of the most talented students to pass through Hogwarts under my purview. An evil wizard killed them when you were very young.”

For the second time in a week, Harry felt like his entire world had just rearranged itself. Murdered. Not a car crash, not useless—

It didn’t change much. He’d done as the snakes said and cast off any particular attachment to the people who he didn’t remember ages ago. Them not being useless addict layabouts… he wasn’t _sad_ , exactly. But it was strange to think he wasn’t making his own reputation now. He’d be living up to theirs.

“They were rather well off.” Still that awful gentle tone. “You needn’t worry about money.”

“Okay,” Harry said, because he couldn’t think of anything else.

Professor Dumbledore cleared the shopping trip with Sister Rachel while Harry ran upstairs. He woke up Raza, who was sleeping under Harry’s pillow like usual, told the snake what was going on as he laced up his battered trainers and grabbed a light jacket, and took off again. Outside his door, Harry paused to lay a hand on the knob and will it locked. His freakishness—no, his _magic_ —would keep anyone from getting in even with a key. Some of the other kids had lockpicks.

He got down to the front door just as Professor Dumbledore finished with the paperwork that would allow Harry to go shopping with him and then go to school up north. Several younger kids were camped out on the couches in the lobby trying to be sneaky while they stared at Harry and the man in the purple dress.

“Ready?” Professor Dumbledore said.

“Yes, sir.”

Harry followed him out onto the porch. He’d much rather have gone shopping on his own but he could always go back later alone and having Dumbledore’s friend show him around couldn’t hurt.

It was only then that he realized there was no car. “Sir, how are we going to get there?”

“Oh, it’ll be easy,” Professor Dumbledore said with a smile. “A friend of mine lives across the street.” He started walking down the short driveway.

Harry almost tripped and had to jog to catch up. _“Mrs. Figg?”_

“Indeed.”

“She’s a—a witch?”

Professor Dumbledore frowned at him. “Witches and wizards can be friends with Muggles, Harry.”

“Of course, sir,” he said hurriedly. _He_ was planning on doing no such thing but he didn’t have to say that yet. Professor Dumbledore was clearly the likes-to-think-the-best-of-everyone type. “Muggles?”

“Ah, just a wizarding term for nonmagical people.”

Harry liked that much better than calling them ‘normal people’ as he had been his whole life.

“So she is a—Muggle then?”

“I didn’t say that.”

Professor Dumbledore had the faintest hint of a smile on his face. Harry absolutely refused to show him any kind of expression. The Professor didn’t say anything else, so Harry didn’t either.

They crossed the narrow street, walked up Mrs. Figg’s short driveway, and stepped onto her sagging porch. Harry looked around the weedy garden with a curled lip. No way was Mrs. Figg a witch. People with magic wouldn’t live like _this_. Surely.

Professor Dumbledore knocked.

“Good morn—Dear Morgana! Albus!”

So he hadn’t been lying. Mrs. Figg, the creepy cat lady who sometimes brought over cookies on Sundays after Mass, was friends with a wizard. She pulled her bathrobe tighter and shuffled aside. A cat made a break for the open door. “Come in, come in… T-tea?”

“No, thank you, Arabella. How have you been?” Professor Dumbledore stepped into the house. Harry followed a bit uncertainly.

“W-well, Albus, very well! Oh! And you must be young Mr. Potter! So lovely to meet you at last! Officially, I mean, I see you on the weekends sometimes but you’re never around when the dear Sisters invite me in…”

 _That’s because you’re creepy_. “I’m sorry,” he said, easily putting on the sweet young boy mask. “If I’d known that you wanted to see me I’d have stuck around a bit more. It’s just that I usually spend Sundays reading.”

Mrs. Figg looked alarmed. “No, no, you mustn’t _apologize_ , gracious… It was just ever such an honor to live across from you, I always hoped for a glimpse when I went over, and now you’re standing in my living room!”

He was. And he wanted to be somewhere else. Her entire house stank of cats.

Then something she’d said clicked. “Er… an honor?”

“Why, yes, of course! You’re the Boy Who Lived!”

He stared at her blankly. “I’m… what?”

“You’re… Albus, you h-haven’t _told_ him?”

“I had hoped to allow Hagrid to do so,” Professor Dumbledore said genially. For some reason, he’d gone to stand by Mrs. Figg’s fireplace, and picked up a pot from the mantle. Even weirder, Mrs. Figg didn’t seem to question it. “Harry, my boy… you must understand, the wizard who killed your parents… He was a madman bent on conquering wizarding Britain and killing or enslaving its Muggle population.”

Harry blinked. _Go big or go home, I guess?_

“He killed at a whim and generally terrified everyone,” Professor Dumbledore said quietly. “The Ministry of Magic was confused and helpless. A small group of independent volunteers organized with me to fight him… I can say, all humility aside, that I am one of the most powerful wizards alive in the world today. Lord Voldemort—” Mrs. Figg flinched—“also known as Tom Riddle, was another. No one survived once he’d set his sights on killing them. Including your parents. Until he turned his wand on you on October 31, 1981… and then he failed to kill you. Not only did he fail but he somehow managed to destroy his own body in the process.”

“So… he messed up,” Harry said. “I mean—I can’t have done anything. I was one.”

Professor Dumbledore chuckled. Mrs. Figg managed a smile but Harry wasn’t paying her much attention. She didn’t matter, in the big scheme of things; Professor Dumbledore definitely would.

“Very astute,” Professor Dumbledore said. “No one is quite sure precisely how you, as a child, defeated one of the most powerful wizards ever recorded, but predominant theories hold that your mother sacrificed herself to save your life, and that sacrifice, combined with the purity and innocence of an infant, invoked one of the deepest magical forces we know of: Love.”

Harry barely stopped himself from sneering. Love, ha. Love, as far as he was concerned, was a neurochemical con job, and not one he was likely to fall for. “And… I’m famous for that?”

Mrs. Figg smiled. Her lips trembled and she twisted her hands together. “Yes, dear boy, yes! For… saving us all from You-Know-Who…”

“Professor, sir… You said I _destroyed his body._ Not that he died.”

“Ahh, once again you prove you’ve inherited your mother’s brains.” Professor Dumbledore looked delighted. “You see, Tom Riddle dabbled in the Dark Arts, a branch of magic known to twist the mind and soul of the user. He found an archaic spell in an Egyptian tomb that could only be used once, by one human being, before its power was spent, and he used it to tether his soul to this world. He was cast out as a wraith, less than a ghost or ghoul, weak and so very close to death, yet unable to die.

“At risk of sounding appallingly arrogant… I then placed you in the care of your aunt and uncle, and dedicated the next six years of my life to discovering precisely how Riddle’s soul was held here, and undoing his work. I succeeded in the autumn of nineteen eighty-eight, returned to England, and took up my post as Headmaster of Hogwarts… which, out of all my titles and responsibilities, remains by far my favorite.” He finished the little speech with a laugh that invited people to join in. Harry pasted a grin on his face—made sure it reached his eyes, because that was how you faked a smile—and turned over what he’d said.

There were several things to learn there, buried under the heroism and history. For some reason, a school headmaster had the power or position to determine where a famous war orphan went. Meaning, Harry’s horrible life was this man’s fault. That same headmaster was apparently in charge of Harry’s life now and also probably pretty famous for finishing off this Tom Riddle a.k.a. Lord Voldemort—which was just the dumbest name ever.

“So he’s gone now? Riddle or whatever?”

“Yes. I am sure of it, and the best magical minds have confirmed my success. You have nothing more to fear from him, my boy.”

Harry slumped a little. “Thank you, sir.”

“I only did what any would in my position,” Professor Dumbledore said, waving it off. “Now, my life goal of collecting ten thousand unique pairs of socks, _that_ would be worth writing about. Alas, I have not yet achieved it. People insist upon giving me books. One can hope.”

“…right,” Harry said. So the man was obviously a little unstable. Or he just liked making Harry nervous.

“Are you off to Diagon Alley for your shopping trip, dearie?” Mrs. Figg said, beaming. “Oh, I remember when my brother went, so exciting…”

Her brother, but not her. Weird.

“Indeed we are,” Professor Dumbledore said. “And I have a meeting in an hour with the Alchemists’ Guild, so, Mr. Potter, if you would.” He offered the little jar he’d been holding.

Harry looked inside. Some kind of glittery greenish powder.

“Go on, take a pinch,” Mrs. Figg encouraged, hovering.

Slowly, he reached into the jar and got a pinch of the powder, and then stood there feeling a bit foolish.

“Floo is ever so much safer than Apparition for young people,” Mrs. Figg said. Harry added ‘Floo’ and ‘Apparition’ to the list of things he was going to look up later. The supply list had books on it, which meant there had to be a bookstore. Once he had money he was going _straight_ there.

“Just do as I do,” Professor Dumbledore advised with a wink, and stepped into the fireplace. Harry’s eyes about popped out of his head as the fireplace _expanded_ to fit the very tall man. _“Diagon Alley!”_ Professor Dumbledore shouted, throwing the powder at his feet, and Harry skittered backwards as green fire burst to life and swallowed him whole.

The fireplace shrank back down to its normal size.

So that was the Floo.

“Just like he did, dearie, you’ll be fine,” Mrs. Figg assured him.

Harry looked at her. “Mrs. Figg, the Sisters always said such nice things about you, but they always said it like you didn’t always live here. Why did you move out here of all places?”

“Oh, I just like the countryside,” she said, shuffling her feet. “I was living in a suburban neighborhood before this…  It was a lovely house but such absolutely awful neighbors. And when I heard you were living in this area, well, I simply had to come!”

“I’m glad you did,” he said. His face was starting to hurt from all the fake smiles. “All of us really looked forward to your cookies on the weekends… Would you mind if I, I dunno, came over to visit sometimes? This summer? I just have so many questions…”

“Of course, of course!” Predictably, she looked over the moon. “Oh, I would love that, Harry, I really would. But go on, you don’t want to keep Albus waiting!”

“Right, of course, sorry.”

Harry bit his lip and stepped into the fireplace. It stretched and… that was the _weirdest_ feeling, watching it grow around him while the rest of the room stayed the same.

 _Here goes_. He took a deep breath and threw the powder at his feet. _“Diagon Alley!”_

Green flame whooshed.

The world started spinning like he was getting sucked down a giant drain. Harry clamped his eyes shut and his elbows at his sides.

He hit the ground with a jolt and stumbled forward. A hand clamped around his arm and held him upright.

“Sorry,” Harry said to the owner of the hand, a snaggle-toothed old man in a flat cap.

“No problem, laddie, most Muggle-borns have quite a time of it the first time they Floo!” the man said, laughing. He flicked a stick of wood—a wand—and the ash fell off Harry’s clothes and hair. He stared openmouthed at the pile on the floor. “There yeh go. Got Dumbledore to pick you up, eh? Lucky kid!”

“Thank you, sir,” Harry said, squinting at the man in the cap.

“Go on, don’t keep ‘im waiting,” the man said with a grin.

Harry went.

Professor Dumbledore was lingering near the bar, chatting with a woman in a pointy hat and a long dress thing like the one Professor Dumbledore was wearing except fitted and in a much nicer shade of dark green. He excused himself when Harry arrived. “In a bit, Madam Marchbanks, in a bit, I’ve a charge to look after. This way, Harry,” he said, and led Harry away, but not before he caught a glimpse of the woman’s astonished face.

“Right back here… Great Scott, I promised Elderberry I’d speak with him before the meeting, Harry, I must be off. Back there, in the corner booth, that’s Hagrid.”

“The large man?” Harry said uncertainly.

“That’s the one! Have an excellent day, and don’t fall down any waterslides!”

Harry stared after Professor Dumbledore’s retreating purple back. Was that actually something to be worried about?

Probably not. Probably just the Professor being odd. But still.

“Er, excuse me,” he said to the (very large, and very intimidating) man in the booth Professor Dumbledore pointed to.

“Wha—oh yeh mus’ be Harry!” the giant boomed, turning on him with such excitement that Harry skittered back a step. “I haven’t seen yeh since you were a wee thing!”

“…sorry,” Harry said.

The giant—Hagrid, was it?—looked alarmed. “No, don’ apologize, yeh were hidden for yer own safety!”

 _Right, I was so safe getting beaten up every week by packs of stupid Muggle orphans_. Harry really hoped wizarding children were better than Muggles.

Then he realized the pub had gone completely silent.

Harry turned around.

“My word, it’s Harry Potter!” someone cried. A tiny witch in a pointed hat and bottle blue robes burst into tears and the next thing Harry knew, he was shaking hands with everyone in the pub.

“An honor, Mr. Potter, an honor!”

 “Mr. Potter, so good to see you’ve rejoined us at last—”

“Doris Crockford, Mr. Potter, can’t believe I’m meeting you in person!”

“So proud, Mr. Potter, I’m just so proud.”

Hagrid nudged Harry. “Tha’s Professor Quirrell, he teaches Muggle Studies up at Hogwarts.”

“Pleased to meet you, Professor,” Harry said, shaking the teacher’s hand. He looked pretty ordinary but it never hurt to be nice to teachers.

“I went to school around the same time as your mother, you know,” Professor Quirrell said with a wink. “She was quite the brilliant witch. I expect we’ll see great things from you, Mr. Potter.”

Harry smiled. He liked the sound of _that_. A brilliant mother was much better than an alcoholic one, and also, he thought he wanted to be _great_.

“All righ’, all righ’, tha’s enough,” Hagrid said, stepping between Harry and the crowd when Professor Quirrell almost got shoved aside. “Lots ter buy, gotta get goin’. Come on, Harry, this way.”

“Please excuse me,” Harry said to the room at large, and trotted after Hagrid.

The giant led him to a yard with a high brick wall around it. Harry hung back by the door to the pub. Getting trapped in a small space like this never ended well.

But Hagrid didn’t do anything remotely threatening. Instead he produced a pink umbrella from somewhere inside his huge manky coat and tapped it on the wall.

The brick he’d tapped quivered, and shrank, and then the whole wall was folding in on itself somehow, and on the other side—

“Welcome ter Diagon Alley,” Hagrid said with a broad grin.

He hauled Harry through the entrance and Harry was too entranced to swat the hand off his shoulder like he usually would. This was even better than he’d _dreamed._

A fly bounced off his cheek and Harry realized he was gaping like an idiot. He snapped his mouth shut and schooled his expression. He was _not_ going to wander around like a tourist, not here in this world of magic and wonder, where he _belonged_.

“All righ,’” Hagrid said. “First stop, Gringotts—tha’s the wizarding bank. This way, Harry, don’ get too excited now, yer can shop once we get yer money…”

Money. He had money. That was a weird thought. How much could it really be, though, if he’d been shunted aside to an orphanage his whole life? Probably his parents had just set up a trust to pay for his education. Muggles did that. He’d learned that when he was looking up how to pay for university since Saint Hedwig’s would never be able to.

“How do you know Professor Dumbledore?” he asked, trying to be subtle about staring at a shop window. They had buckets of _eyeballs_ on display.

Hagrid perked right up. “Ah, well, I was in school abou’ fifty years ago now, an’… I was expelled in my third year, an’ my wand snapped. Professor Dumbledore, now, he’s a great man, Dumbledore is, he offered me a position as gamekeeper and later Keeper of the Keys at Hogwarts.”

“What’s Hogwarts like?”

“Ah, it’s amazing.” Hagrid grinned down at Harry. He really wasn’t that scary if you looked past the huge beard and black eyes. Harry still didn’t like him, per se, but Hagrid didn’t have a malicious bone in his body. “Absolutely gorgeous… The school’s built in a castle, an’ it’s been around since Merlin’s day, even though the Founders didn’t start taking students until after he died. It’s up north, in the Scottish mountains, an’ the views are just the best. An’ some o’ the creatures in the forest are bloody amazing! Ministry has to keep ‘em aroun’ magical places or the Muggles might catch on, yeh know. I saw a crup in there once…”

Harry tuned him out as Hagrid started talking about things he didn’t understand yet. This was another thing to research. Creatures. Harry’s eyes widened. Yetis, chupacabras, the Loch Ness Monster, dragons, pixies—maybe the Muggle stories were just people seeing magical creatures and getting things wrong.

“—but I’ve been talking too long, here’s Gringotts!”

“It’s impressive,” Harry said, tilting his head back to take in the multi-story white marble building. Hagrid didn’t seem the type to hold ignorance against him, so he asked, “And Muggles can’t see any of it?”

“Nah, they don’ see what’s in front o’ their faces, bless them. Those’re goblins, by the way,” Hagrid added, pointing to the two short, angry-looking human-like things guarding Gringotts’ front doors. Each one was armored and holding a spear, and each one frowned in their direction. Hagrid was trying to whisper but even his whisper was really loud. “Don’ ever cross a goblin, Harry, they’re nasty little blighters an’ they’re not fond of wizards, mark my words. They run Gringotts an’ all the vaults underneath it. This is goblin land.”

“So is it like visiting a foreign country?” Harry murmured, as they started up the steps. “If the goblins control the whole bank…”

“A bit, yeah, yeh migh’ say that,” Hagrid said. “C’mon, here yeh go.” He shouldered a door open and walked through, holding it so Harry could look at the words carved on it.

Harry glanced indifferently over the dramatic rhyme. It looked more like a scare tactic than anything else. He was more interested in the goblin nearest him. It was about Harry’s height, but wrinkled and lean and clearly an adult. The spear looked wicked sharp.

Years of fighting tooth and nail to keep his room private and safe and _his_ had taught Harry the value of having your own territory. On the rare occasion that he had to have one of the other children come inside, or, worse, a family the Sisters were trying to adopt him to, he’d looked at them pretty much the same way the goblin was eyeing him now. Judging if they were a threat and wary about letting anyone into his personal space. He’d always had it easier when they were quiet and didn’t immediately start wandering around poking in his things, and while he had no idea what goblin etiquette was like, politeness almost never hurt.

All this shot through his head in a second. Harry dipped his head to the goblin and followed Hagrid into the bank.

Hagrid was paying him no attention, too busy rummaging through his pockets. “Ah… okay, hang on, I know it’s in here somewhere…”

“Can I help you?” a snide voice said.

Hagrid looked up, beamed at the goblin teller who’d spoken, and marched over, pulling Harry with one huge hand. “Morning. We’ve come to take some money out of Mr. Potter’s trust vault.”

“You have his key?”

“Got it here somewhere,” said Hagrid, and began emptying several pockets onto the counter. A pile of moldy dog biscuits scattered across the scroll lying in front of the goblin. Harry winced and drifted aside, watching the next goblin over weigh a pile of rubies as big as coals, and trying to pretend he had no idea who Hagrid was.

“Ah! Here we go!” Hagrid produced a tiny golden key that almost vanished in his hands.

The goblin inspected it. “This seems to be in order. Griphook!”

This was yet another goblin, one of the spear-carrying guards positioned at random around Gringotts’ huge white-and-gold atrium. “Yes?”

“Take our guest Mr. Potter down to vault three one five,” the first goblin ordered.

“Right this way, Mr. Potter,” Griphook said.

“Hang on jus’ one second,” Hagrid protested. “I’ve got ter go down with him, haven’t I?”

Griphook turned such a vicious sneer on him that Harry was mildly surprised Hagrid didn’t crumble on the spot. “No, Mr. Hagrid. It is Gringotts policy to permit only persons visiting a vault past the atrium. If you will _excuse_ us.”

Hagrid’s weak protests chased them across the atrium but several other goblins jumped in to argue with him and Harry and Griphook managed to disappear into the crowds. Harry switched to autopilot, trailing in Griphook’s wake and trying to think things over before he got too overwhelmed. Hagrid’s insistence on coming down was kind of weird. What did he care if Harry went to his own vault? Unless there were things in it Harry wasn’t supposed to see?

Surprise derailed that train of thought when Griphook led him out of the atrium. Instead of more marble, they were in a narrow rough-hewn stone passageway lined with purple torches. A two-rail metal track lay on the ground, and as Griphook whistled, something farther down it began to rattle.

“If you don’t mind me asking, why is Gringotts so heavily guarded?” Harry said. “Muggle banks don’t typically have armed guards.”

Griphook sneered at him but Harry was starting to think that was just a default expression for goblins. “Muggle money is paper. We trade in gold, silver, and bronze, Mr. Potter. Moreover, Muggles may have their guns and computer technology but magicals have wands, which makes them far more dangerous and requires Gringotts to maintain much stricter security measures. The main reason is simply that the bank and these tunnels beneath it are the territory of a sovereign state not subject to your laws. We are guarding our border as well as your money.”

So he’d been right about it being someone else’s territory, if not exactly how serious the difference was. Harry had about ten more questions now but most of them involved things like where all the goblins lived, which, based on how secretive they’d been so far, would not go over well. He went with a safer “So would a thief be arrested by goblins or wizards? And what court would they go to?”

“Goblin court, under goblin laws,” Griphook said with a nasty smile. “There’s a reason no one is ever foolish enough to try, Mr. Potter.”

Harry grinned back, with teeth.

A cart rumbled out of the darkness and came to a stop next to them. Griphook clambered inside without hesitation, and Harry followed, settling in at the back. The goblin’s spear slotted neatly into a bracket along the side, and with a snap of Griphook’s fingers, the whole thing shivered and then burst into heatless flame.

Harry added the question of why goblins apparently didn’t need wands to use magic to his list.

With another whistle, they were off.

The cart rocketed down twisting and turning passages at breakneck speed. Harry was torn between terror and delight. This was fun but also he was pretty sure if he flew out of the cart at this speed, not even magic could save him. He tried to remember the path, but after _left right middle fork left down right,_ he lost track. The cart seemed to know the way because Griphook wasn’t steering.

It finally screeched to a halt.

Cautiously, Harry peeked over the left side. The drop was a solid hundred feet down, although dozens of other cart tracks twisted through the badly lit cavern, so he’d probably bounce off a few if he jumped.

“Don’t fall,” Griphook advised with another evil smile.

“Noted,” Harry said, climbing out the right side of the cart onto the ledge.

Six iron doors lined the ledge, each one about twenty feet apart. 315 was the last one to Harry’s right, and identical to the others.

Griphook unlocked the door. Clouds of green smoke billowed out, and Harry coughed, wiping at his eyes.

“Security measure.” Griphook sounded bored. “It would immobilize you if you weren’t authorized to enter.”

Harry nodded and stepped inside as the smoke cleared. 

His jaw dropped. Mounds of gold. Heaps of silver. Columns of bronze. So much precious metal it was staggering. Literally; his legs gave out and he had to lean on the edge of the vault door.

“All this,” he said, and his voice came out a bit raspy. “All this is mine?”

“Yes.” Griphook checked what looked like a bit of gray slate attached to the inside of his left forearm. “Although the trustee appointed by your mother seems to have set a two hundred galleon withdrawal limit per year.”

“Who’s that?” Harry said.

Griphook blinked at him. “You don’t _know?”_

“Obviously,” Harry snarled, and then cursed himself. He wasn’t supposed to be rude like that, dammit, normally he wore his masks better. He was just—furious. Confused.

But the goblin didn’t recoil or get offended or scold. “I ask, Mr. Potter, because you are the Heir to a noble House,” he said. “You will be Lord Potter when you obtain your majority. A respectable rank, if not the highest. You should have been getting your vault statements from the time you turned seven.”

“I haven’t.”

“Clearly.” Griphook studied him for a moment. “Seeing as we are in private at the moment, and I am the Potter accounts manager, it is my duty to educate you as soon as possible about your responsibilities as a Gringotts client. Perhaps we could have that conference now.”

“That rule about only people visiting their own vault was made-up, wasn’t it?” Harry said.

Griphook smirked. “If you had authorized a companion, he certainly could have joined us, but Rubeus Hagrid has no vault here and as such has never had cause to learn our rules.”

The goblins were clever. Frighteningly so. “How do I know you’re the Potter accounts manager?” Harry said.

Griphook grinned again. “You don’t, yet. We can postpone the meeting until we return to the surface and I can provide proof of my role. Although it is Gringotts policy for account managers to always accompany their clients to their vaults.”

“How does the money work, then?” Harry said, gesturing vaguely at the vault.

“Twenty-nine bronze knuts to a silver sickle, and seventeen sickles to a gold galleon,” Griphook said. “This trust vault contains…” He looked at the slate on his arm again. “Fifty thousand four hundred twenty-one galleons, five thousand six hundred and ninety sickles, and seven thousand forty-nine knuts. You may withdraw up to two hundred galleons of that a year, as set by your trustee and magical guardian, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore.” Something flickered across his face and was gone.

A small pile of knuts shivered, and then blew apart and scattered across the floor.

Harry closed his eyes and reined in his freakishn— _magic_ , his magic.

“And is that an… unusual withdrawal limit?” he asked.

Griphook picked at his teeth. “It’s quite standard. Many magical families include such stipulations on their children’s vaults.”

Harry frowned. It felt a little weird but he knew absolutely nothing about wizarding banking and finance. An oversight he needed to fix, and soon. “And do I need to carry them around all the time?”

Griphook snapped his fingers and a square of black leather appeared in his palm. “This is a Gringotts wallet,” he explained. “Inside this front pocket is an unlimited number of payment slips, rather like Muggle cheques, I believe, although ours work by magical signature. Impossible to forge. Write the recipient, the item to purchase, the amount to be paid, and your given name on a slip, and slide it in the back pocket. It will reappear in Gringotts and the payment processed within twenty-four hours. The wallet costs seventeen galleons to purchase.”

Seventeen out of two hundred. Depending on how much school supplies cost—which might be a lot, because Harry would need a whole new wardrobe—that was quite a dent. Still, the risk of losing the coins or getting them stolen was high. And he was used to spending frugally. He’d been shopping on his own with the tiny state allowance for his clothes since he was seven. “I’ll take it.”

Griphook snapped his fingers again. “It’s done.”

They left the vault. Harry scooped thirty-four sickles into his pocket on the way out just in case he needed cash for some reason.

The cart ride back to the surface was a little easier to handle, now that he’d survived it once. Harry shut his eyes and hung on and sorted through his questions. He needed to work out if his vault had fees attached, if Dumbledore could take his money as well as restrict Harry’s access to it, if Dumbledore could change the withdrawal limit at all, and why his magical guardian was someone he’d never met before in his life. Also, this whole Lord Potter thing. Harry really had no idea because Muggles didn’t hold with titles much anymore but he was fairly sure noble children weren’t supposed to grow up in poor orphanages.

“Maybe we could have our meeting some other time,” he suggested as they climbed out of the cart. “I, ah, don’t want to keep Hagrid waiting.” He also didn’t want to take out a banner announcing that he was looking into his financial situation. For as long as he could remember, Harry had survived by assuming that it was best to keep as much of his plans secret as possible, and he wasn’t about to change that with something so important.

Griphook leered at him knowingly. “So polite. I look forward to your next visit, Mr. Potter. Perhaps over the winter holidays.”

Harry decided another respectful nod was best and left the goblin to return to his guard post, joining Hagrid by the big front doors.

“Yeh took a while,” Hagrid said.

Harry beamed at him. “I had to have Griphook explain how all the money works. Why do the coins have such funny names?”

That was all it took. Hagrid completely forgot about the long trip and started leading Harry around Diagon Alley. As he'd suspected, two hundred galleons wasn’t really enough for all this. The telescope alone cost twenty-one galleons what with all the charms wizards put on them, and the pewter cauldron, lined with nonreactive varnish guaranteed to last ten years, was another thirty. They got a secondhand trunk for twenty galleons. Hagrid found him a used set of brass scales that worked if you bent down and squinted at them a bit for half price, and they went to a discount potion supplies store for Harry’s first-year potions kit. Harry could’ve spent a whole day in there alone—potions sounded like a combination of magic, chemistry, physiology, and cooking—but Hagrid dragged him away from a bucket of toad spleens. “Yeh still have ter get yer school books and wand,” he said. “Oh, and robes…”

Right. Harry could always come back and look later.

“Tha’s the main bookstore,” Hagrid said, pointing at a huge, cheerful storefront reading Flourish & Blotts. “How much do yeh have left?”

Harry ran through the math in his head. “Ah… ninety-four galleons.” Only if he included the two galleons worth of sickles in his pocket.

“All righ’, let’s get yer books next. Migh’ be easier to go to a used bookstore.”

“Good idea,” Harry agreed, looking longingly at the Flourish & Blotts storefront. _Next time_ , he promised himself. “Do you know of one?”

“Eh… yeah, righ’ there, next to Madam Malkin’s and Amanuensis Quills.”

Harry could barely make out the sign, Jarred’s Used & New Books. The shop looked small and dusty but well-loved. That would work.

“Harry, d’yeh mind if I head off to the Leaky Cauldron for a pick-me-up?” Hagrid shuffled his feet. “Gringotts always freaks me out a bit.”

“Go ahead,” Harry said absently. Hagrid didn’t strike him as the bookish type anyway, and he fully intended to buy as many books as he could fit within his budget. Although carrying them might be a problem—he was already a bit weighed down, even though Hagrid had shrunk Harry’s trunk and stuck it in his pocket for safekeeping.

A soft chime rang through the bookstore as Harry pushed the glass door open even though he couldn’t see a bell. Magic, then. He peered around. The shelves were twisty and confusing, shadowed while still being lit enough to read the titles. Dust and something else tickled his nose when he breathed, and Harry grinned, coming fully into the store and peeking at the closest shelf. This was his kind of place. It smelled like secrets.

To his delight, almost all the books cost sickles. A few massive or gold-bound books had price tags in the one-to-five galleon range and one with a solid gold cover in the front window cost _nineteen_ galleons, but Harry ignored all those.

 _Fundamentals of Magical Law_ caught his eye and Harry picked it up. The book was as dusty on the outside as the title hinted it would be on the inside, but he did have to learn about the laws of this world…

“Looking for anything in particular?”

Harry jumped and whipped around. “No, sorry—I know you!” he blurted without thinking.

The wizard in front of him blinked. “Er, you do?”

“Sorry.” Harry cursed the slip and slid into his mask. “You probably don’t remember—it was years ago. I was sitting on a bench in Surrey, across from a Tesco, and you talked to me about not wearing shoes in the snow.”

“I… gave you my telephone number,” the wizard said slowly.

Harry smiled bashfully. “Jarred Jigger, right?”

“That’s me! What a coincidence.” Mr. Jigger was older than Harry remembered, and dressed in much less brightly colored clothing—oh. Oh. Harry had almost forgotten how confused he was by the kind stranger’s weird dress-like clothing but now he realized it was a wizard’s robe. “Muggle-born, I take it?”

Harry sighed and added another thing to his list of research projects. He felt more and more like he’d been dropped in a foreign culture with no guidebook. “I… my parents were magical.”

Mr. Jigger frowned, obviously confused.

“I… they’re dead,” Harry said. He wasn’t quite ready to give up his real name yet. He liked anonymity too much. Although he could probably use being the Boy Who Lived, he didn’t want to start doing that too early, and waste it. “I grew up with Muggle relatives.”

“Disgraceful,” Mr. Jigger muttered. Harry made a face and nodded, noting with pleasure the way Mr. Jigger relaxed a little. People always liked when others agreed with them. It helped that Harry _did_ actually agree, of course, but still.

“I don’t have enough money for Flourish & Blotts,” Harry admitted. “So Hagrid pointed me here. D’you have the first-year books for Hogwarts?”

“Absolutely.” Mr. Jigger took the list and muttered something about low standards. “Hagrid, did you say? The gamekeeper?”

“Yes.”

“Huh.” Mr. Jigger plucked two books off a shelf and handed them to Harry. “Odd choice. Usually one of the other teachers handles Muggleborn and Muggle-raised students. Hagrid is… well, he doesn’t know some of the issues you’ll face.”

“Like?” Harry asked.

“Writing with quills, for one. Here.” Mr. Jigger plucked down a slim book. “Two sickles—a guidebook on trimming quills and how to write with them. Otherwise your handwriting will be appalling and, fair warning, some of the professors grade on neatness.”

Harry added it to his pile. Switching from Muggle to magical education didn’t impact his plans to be the best in school at all. “Anything else?”

“I would advise reading up on etiquette and manners,” Mr. Jigger said. “Some old wizarding families can be… touchy.”

“What about nobles?” Harry said. “It’s just I heard someone get called Lord something earlier.”

Mr. Jigger looked at him for a long moment. “I can recommend you books on that, as well.”

“And magical law, please,” Harry said. “And this Ministry of yours, and the history of Hogwarts, and magical creatures… Actually, do you have a map of your store so I can browse a bit?”

“I’ve got a bibliophile on my hands,” Mr. Jigger said with a laugh. “I do have a map, right here.” He flicked his wand, plucked a paper out of the air, and handed it over to Harry like this was completely normal. Harry’s eyes widened when he saw his own name on the simple line-drawn map, even more when he took a step and his name _moved_.

“What’s a bibliophile?” he said.

“A book lover.” Mr. Jigger didn’t sound condescending or rude. “I recommend reading _Hogwarts, A History_. It’s horrifically dry but it’ll catch you up on a lot of the history your magic-raised peers will already know.”

“Okay.” Harry added it to his fast-growing pile.

An hour later, he had forty-three books in a pile in a corner. Several other customers had come and gone, but Mr. Jigger didn’t pressure Harry, and patiently answered every hesitant question. Harry was actually really glad he’d come here instead of the big bookstore. Some of his textbooks, being used, had annotations in them, but the instructions were still readable. He’d grabbed a book on basic self-defense, another one on fundamental warding, several on law and government, one on wizarding etiquette, and five more about potions right away, and then kept right on browsing.

Mr. Jigger found him with his nose buried in a potions book. “Like potions, hm?”

“Yes, sir,” Harry said, looking up.

“My sister runs Slug and Jigger Apothecary, down the street,” Mr. Jigger said with a grin. “With Hesphaetor Slughorn. Drop in sometime and tell them I sent you. Amariah can be prickly but Hesphaetor loves children and answering questions.”

Harry wouldn’t be asking too many of those, but it would be worth a look, at least. The discount potions store had been kind of creepy and he would like to check out a proper apothecary. “Thank you, sir.”

“You ready?”

“I think so,” said Harry, looking over his pile of books. He started to gather them into his arms but Mr. Jigger waved him off. The whole set floated neatly through the air and onto the counter at a flick of Mr. Jigger’s wand.

“I love magic,” Harry muttered. Mr. Jigger laughed.

The total was twenty-five galleons and four sickles. Harry paid it gladly and Mr. Jigger even wrapped the books up and then shrunk the package down small enough to fit in a pocket. “It’ll wear off in four hours, so I recommend being alone and having the package not in your pocket when that happens,” he advised.

“Yes, sir. Thank you.”

“One more thing.” Mr. Jigger glanced around to make sure he had no other customers. “Has anyone talked to you about the House system at school?”

“No.” Harry frowned at the capital letter in Mr. Jigger’s voice.

“Well, you’ll read about it in _Hogwarts, A History_ , but the latest Ministry edition is sanitized and biased.” Mr. Jigger shrugged. “There are four Houses. It’s a secret how you get Sorted, but they’re loosely based off of personal values and personality traits. Kindness and fairness for Hufflepuff, bravery and principles for Gryffindor, cleverness and ambition for Slytherin, and creativity and intelligence for Ravenclaw.”

“Interesting.” Harry immediately chucked Hufflepuff and Gryffindor out the window. He wasn’t particularly brave and fairness was an illusion.

“Yes, it is, but it’s more important than some Muggle school systems,” Mr. Jigger said drily. “Your House is your family at Hogwarts for seven years. I warn you because there’s a—stigma about Slytherin in recent years. Tom Riddle was in Slytherin and since his defeat ten years ago, the house of serpents has had difficulties.”

“What does this have to do with me?” Harry said slowly.

Mr. Jigger smirked. “Well, first of all, I was a Slytherin myself, and I’ll eat one of my books if you don’t get Sorted there. You’ve been wearing what we snakes like to call a ‘mask’ the entire time we’ve been in here, and if I hadn’t seen it slip when you realized you knew me, I’d never have noticed it at all.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry said instantly, pouring as much real apology into his entire bearing as possible. Only when Mr. Jigger laughed did he realize he’d just proved the man’s point.

“No, you’re not, but truly, it’s an impressive show for an eleven-year-old. I’d be doing my House a disservice if I didn’t try to stop any prejudices before they’ve got time to form,” he said. “Slytherin has a bad reputation because we are the house of ambition and cunning. When a Slytherin wants something, he or she will generally achieve that thing. We have more great people than any other House, just as we have more appalling criminals, because our dreams and desires tend to be big and grand. Tom Riddle was a Slytherin but so was Merlin, the greatest wizard in our history.”

“And the second thing?” Harry said.

Mr. Jigger’s grin looked weirdly like Griphook at his nastiest. “I expect it will be _quite_ a dramatic moment when Harry Potter gets sorted into Slytherin. Someone really ought to warn you.”

Harry narrowed his eyes and let the student mask fall, replacing it with the cold and unreadable one he generally used to scare the other orphans. It was as close to unguarded as he ever got. Slytherin did definitely sound like the right House for him, but—“I can see why people would be surprised that the defeater of the Dark Lord went to his House. If it’s as big a deal as all this.”

“Oh, it is,” Mr. Jigger said, a bit darkly. “Especially since he fell. Try not to assume all Slytherins are evil by default, kid.”

“The only Slytherin I know is one of the only people to have ever been kind to me without a motive,” Harry said bluntly. “I never called your number but I remembered.”

Mr. Jigger raised an eyebrow. “Best of luck, then. As a gift, from one Slytherin to another…” He pulled down another book and handed it over. “A biography of Merlin.”

“Thank you.” Harry wasn’t one to turn down free gifts, and as this hadn’t come with a favor attached, he was going to take it and keep it. “Have a nice day, sir.”

“You as well.”

 

* * *

 

 

Jarred Jigger watched the Potter heir leave his store.

He’d seen the kid come in with a mop of wild hair, those horrific Muggle clothes, and a pleasant, curious expression, and profiled him on the spot. He was pretty good at cataloguing people, a talent that had earned him a high place in the Slytherin hierarchy during his time, even if he’d stayed the hell out of blood purity politics and never gone near Riddle’s crew after graduation. The family business needed looking after while Amariah was off getting her Potions and Alchemy Masteries, and with some quiet under-the-counter trades of illegal ingredients when Severus Snape came calling, he’d managed to buy his way out of a bigger commitment. Family was one of that whole set’s biggest values, after all.

The point was that he knew how to read people and he’d seen a Muggleborn poised for Ravenclaw—a kid who’d get eaten alive by the snakes if he was Sorted there. Still, Jarred liked Ravenclaws well enough, and he enjoyed helping curious fellow book lovers, so he’d gone over to help the kid.

And when the boy turned around, he’d seen the faint and famous lightning bolt scar, but more importantly, he’d seen the boy’s mask fall for a split second. The pleasant curiosity disappeared and left something very—strange in its wake.

Jarred had spent seven years in Slytherin, and he’d never seen an eleven-year-old look so _cold_. Nor had he seen anyone that young put on such a good mask so quickly, or execute it so well. It hadn’t slipped again the whole time they were talking until he brought up the subject just to try and get a rise out of the kid. And then, once Potter knew his game was up, he’d just as easily switched to an icy calculation that Jarred almost couldn’t read at all. Oh, he was eleven, and he still made mistakes, like assuming just because he didn’t get fawned over his identity was still a secret—but Jarred would be willing to bet his entire shop on that kid’s Sorting.

Slowly, he pulled out a bit of parchment and scribbled off a note to his sister. Amariah had been Ravenclaw but Hesphaetor was a Slytherin, and one of the friendlier types. Neither of them was the type to interfere, but Jarred wanted them on the lookout for a kid in ratty Muggle clothing with Avada Kedavra-green eyes.

Jarred leaned back in his chair as his owl Winifred fluttered out the window with the note. He hadn’t given Potter _all_ the advice he might have—about new glasses, some hair charms, decent clothes, and blood prejudice issues. That would be cheating.

He smirked. If nothing else, Severus Snape was going to have a very interesting year.

 

* * *

 

 

“Get all yer books?”

“And more,” Harry said, grinning. “Mr. Jigger shrunk them down for me, see? And I got this biography of Merlin. I didn’t know he was real!”

Hagrid, at least, was not clever enough to see through Harry’s mask. That was a relief. When Mr. Jigger brought it up, Harry had felt a moment of pure panic. Only the Sisters weren’t quite fooled by his perfect student mask and that was ‘cause they’d known him since long before he got good at it. But if all wizards were as clever as that—

“Oh, yeah, he was real all righ’,” Hagrid said. “Greatest wizard ter ever live. Although I got ter say, I think Professor Dumbledore migh’ give Merlin a run for his money in a few hundred years!”

 _I really hope not._ “He did seem really smart.”

“Oh, he is! Righ’ famous. Robes next? Here, why not Madam Malkin’s, she sells re-tailored used robes, I think.”

Harry considered his dwindling supply of galleons. “Sounds good.”

Hagrid held the door for Harry and then squeezed in after him, ducking to fit under the door frame. The store inside was a weird cross of a department store from a film and an old-fashioned tailor. Racks of robes in all sizes and colors were placed around the store, surrounded by graceful slow-moving wire mannequins wearing what Harry assumed were the latest wizarding styles. The left side seemed geared towards men and the right towards women, with the middle reserved for assistance, a desk, and several fitting stools backed by mirrors.

“Welcome, welcome,” a young woman said, popping out from behind a rack. “Hogwarts, dear?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Harry said. “First year.”

“Great. Got the lot here—another young man getting fitted, too. This way, please.”

Harry followed her around the desks and counters in the middle of the store to the fitting area at the back. Another boy with blond hair was standing on a stool while a middle-aged witch bustled around him, fiddling with pins and her wand to adjust the fit of his long black robes.

“Up you get,” the witch with Harry said, guiding him onto another footstool. “What’ll you have, dear?”

“He needs the standard first-year package,” Hagrid said loudly.

Harry cleared his throat softly and lifted his shoulders, refusing to show any kind of hesitation. “In re-tailored second-hand robes, please.”

“On a budget?” The saleswitch winked. “Not to worry, we get plenty of those through here. I’ll be right back.”

Harry looked at himself in the mirror as she hurried away, feeling a little foolish in his Muggle clothes. They weren’t as bad as the dimly remembered Dudley hand-me-downs that hung off him like bits of elephant skin, but they were still pretty bad, faded and ill-fitting.

“ _Secondhand_ robes?” the blond boy sneered.

“There’s no shame in owning used clothing,” Harry said coolly, glancing the boy over. He used a look he’d designed to make the other person feel inferior. “Only in not putting effort into your appearance.”

Blondie sniffed. “I’d rather fall off a broom than wear _used robes_. Still, I imagine we can’t all come from wealthy families. I’m Malfoy, Draco Malfoy.”

Hagrid stiffened but Harry stifled a grin. Draco Malfoy had probably never read Muggle fiction and might not appreciate the comparison. “Harry Evans, nice to meet you.”

“Evans.” Malfoy sneered at him, much more rudely than he had about the robes. “That’s not a _wizarding_ name. Your parents are the _right folk_ , aren’t they?”

“See here—” Hagrid began.

“It’s fine, Hagrid,” Harry said, eyeing Malfoy. This was interesting. And it seemed related to that awkward moment about Muggles versus wizards outside Mrs. Figg’s house. “My parents were both magical, if that’s what you mean.”

“Oh. Good,” Malfoy said. “The other sort can be so irritating, don’t you agree? Seeing as they don’t know any of our ways…”

“Where’s yer mum?” Hagrid butted in. “Shouldn’t she be here with yeh?”   

Malfoy looked boredly in Hagrid’s direction while the witch pinning up his robes moved even faster than she had before. “She’s up the street looking at brooms. Have you got your own broom?” he suddenly asked Harry.

“No,” Harry said as his assistant came back with a pile of black fabric. “Shopping on a budget, remember?”

“Oh, yes.” Malfoy frowned as Harry raised his arms and a robe, guided by the witch’s wand, slid over his head. “How unfortunate. First years aren’t allowed their own brooms but I’m going to see if I can smuggle one in somehow. I plan on making the House Quidditch team next year.” Yet another thing to be researching. “You’ve never played, I take it.”

“No, but I like watching,” Harry lied.

“That’s all right, then. Not everyone can be as good on a broom as me.” Malfoy puffed out his chest. “Oh, what House d’you think you’ll be in?”

Hagrid huffed. “Gryffindor, o’ course. All his family have been.”

Well. That could be a problem.

“I had the impression we’re not supposed to know,” he said instead.

Malfoy shrugged. “Yes, well, all the Blacks and Malfoys are in Slytherin, so I expect that’s where I’ll go.”

Hagrid huffed again. Malfoy glared at him and opened his mouth, probably to pick a fight over his wounded family pride, but the witch fitting him cut in with a hasty “That’s you done, dear” and he hopped down.

“I say, would you like to get ice cream with Mother and me?” Malfoy said suddenly, eyeing Harry.

“No, he wouldn’,” Hagrid said. “We’ve got shopping ter finish.”

Malfoy drew himself up. “Suit yourself.”

The rest of the fitting went in silence. Harry left with his three plain black work robes, a pointed hat, a black winter cloak, and a pair of dragonhide protective gloves. Madam Malkin and her assistant tried to get him to buy a pair of boots with temperature-regulation charms but Harry politely declined. He couldn’t afford them. The rest of it cost twenty galleons as it was and he needed to stretch his budget until his next birthday.

“Hagrid, what’s wrong with the Malfoys?” he said once they were out on the street again.

“Oh, they’re all Dark,” Hagrid said firmly. “The whole rotten lot of ‘em. Lucius, the father, he’s in Azkaban—the wizard prison. Life sentence. He supported You-Know-Who an’ got arrested in… eighty-three, I think. His wife was born a Black—one o’ the oldest an’ Darkest families in Britain. All Slytherins, like the Malfoys. She never did anythin’ directly, so she’s still free, an’ her kid’s a right piece o’ work from what I’ve heard.” He nodded sagely.

“And what was that about my parents being in Gryffindor?” Harry said. “Did you know them?”

Hagrid blinked down at him. “’Course I knew them! I’ve been around Hogwarts since the forties! Yer dad was a righ’ prankster, and yer mum was one o’ the brightest minds in Hogwarts in her time.” He shook his shaggy head. “Righ’ shame what happened to ‘em. I reckon they’ll be proud ter see yeh in Hogwarts an’ wearing Gryffindor colors, though.”

Because he was playing the part of the clueless Muggle-raised kid, Harry had to ask. Also, he was a bit curious how Mr. Jigger’s and Hagrid’s accounts might differ. “What are Gryffindor and Slytherin? School Houses?”

“Yep. There’s four of ‘em. Gryffindor, Slytherin, Hufflepuff, an’ Ravenclaw.” Hagrid frowned at a witch who cut them off in the busy street. “Hufflepuff are a lot o’ duffers, most people say. Tha’s rubbish, most of ‘em are decent types. Ravenclaws tend ter be the bookish nerdy ones. Gryffindor’s the best—tha’ was my House, and yer parents’, and Professor Dumbledore’s. Then there’s Slytherin. Not a witch or wizard ever went bad who wasn’ in Slytherin,” he said darkly. “You-Know-Who was one.”

Harry really doubted that there had never been a criminal from one of the other Houses, or that a fourth of his fellow students were evil, but okay. “And people think I’ll be in Gryffindor?”

“’Course! Yer parents were an’ it runs in the Potter family. Yeh migh’ do well in Ravenclaw, too, with all those books yeh bought,” he added, chuckling.

“I’d probably do well there,” Harry said. He would, too, but he didn’t _want_ to go there. Honestly, he liked the sound of Slytherin. Hopefully Mr. Jigger and Hagrid were exaggerating the waves that would create.

“All righ’. Yeah, Ravenclaw wouldn’ be—Merlin, I almost forgot to get yer birthday present!”

Harry stopped dead in the street. “My what?”

Hagrid grinned at him. “Birthday gift, o’course. Yeh still gotta get yer wand, an’ I don’ think you’ve got enough for a pet, but here, I’ll get yeh an owl. Dead useful, owls.”

He took off through the crowd. Harry couldn’t quite process the idea of just randomly buying an almost-complete-stranger a birthday gift even if he _had_ known Harry’s parents and didn’t catch up until right outside Eeyelops Owl Emporium.

 It was dark inside, with a musty smell and a faint rustling and cooing noise going up from all corners of the store. Birdcages hung from the ceiling and were stacked on shelves around the sides. Most of them were open and some of the birds fluttered around the store from one cage to another, but for the most part they seemed to be resting. A section off to the side looked to sell cats and some kind of weird split-tailed dog things, and Harry could hear snatches of snake language from a dimly-lit back corner of the store.

“Go on, pick out an owl,” Hagrid urged, grinning. He’d managed to keep his voice down and they only got a few weird looks from other families shopping for pets. “How abou’ this one?”

 He pointed at a big snowy owl sitting on a perch. Harry eyed it for a few seconds, and its predatory amber eyes watching him back. The bird hooted lightly and he grinned, focusing a bit of magic on it. He couldn’t communicate, exactly, but sometimes if he really tried he could do more than just will animals to do what he wanted. This time he thought about an invitation.

Within three seconds, he had the beginnings of a headache, but then the owl fluttered its wings and hopped forward. Harry barely got his arm up in time for it to land. The bird was heavy and her talons dug into his forearm almost hard enough to break the skin.

“She likes yeh,” Hagrid said delightedly.

“What do you say… are you a girl or a boy, hm?” Harry mused, looking the bird over. He had no clue how to tell if a bird was a male or female. What did bird genitalia even look like?

“That’s a lady bird you got, and a fine one.”

The bird hooted angrily over Harry’s shoulder. He turned slowly so he wouldn’t drop her and smiled at the storekeeper. “Thanks.”

“I’ll give you that one half off, seeing as no one’s been able to go near her,” the storekeeper said, giving the bird an evil eye. “Seven galleons.”

Hagrid paid without hesitation, and then another two for the cage and perch and a bag of owl treats. The storekeeper shrunk down all the supplies and Hagrid stuffed them into yet another pocket.

Harry emerged from the store, blinking, with the pretty white bird on his shoulder.

“What’re yeh gonna name her?” Hagrid asked.

“I’m not sure.” Harry glanced up at the bird’s fierce beak. “I’ll think about it. Will she know where to go if I tell her to head back to Saint Hedwig’s?”

“Yeah, owls are dead smart.” Hagrid ran a huge, gentle hand over the bird, and she cooed and ruffled her feathers at the touch. He smiled. “This one’s especially so, I think.”

“Thank you,” Harry said honestly. “This is the best birthday present ever.”

“Ah, it was nothin’.” Hagrid looked embarrassed. “I’m just glad I was able to help, is all. Go on, pretty lady. Saint Hedwig’s orphanage, an’ wait for yer boy there, okay?”

The owl hooted again and took off in a rush of wings.

“She’s a good one,” Hagrid said happily. “I know my creatures and that one’ll stick by yeh her whole life.”

“Thank you,” Harry said again. He couldn’t remember the last time he thanked anyone for anything and meant it, but Hagrid had offered him a kindness with no strings attached. Even Mr. Jiggers had an angle—getting a smart, ambitious, famous kid in his House. He was probably also thinking about helping Slytherin’s reputation by putting the Boy Who Lived there. Although he hadn’t been angling for anything that day when he stopped and offered Harry his name and number for help.

“O’ course.”

And then Hagrid was _hugging_ him.

Harry squashed the urge to hurl the man away from him. That much magic would exhaust him for days, and cause a scene, and this was _normal_. Normal people did this. Normal _wizards_ did this. Even if it made him want to scream. No one ever touched him unless they were causing pain.

Thank God Hagrid let go quickly. “All righ,’ last stop. We gotta get yer wand. Only one place for it. Ollivanders has the best, an’ yeh gotta have the best wand.”

Harry grinned. _This_ he’d been looking forward to all day.

The shop was narrow and shabby. Peeling gold letters over the door read _Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C._ A single reddish brown wand lay on a sun-faded purple pillow in the window. Behind it, through the dust on the windows, Harry could just make out a counter and a very narrow passage going back into the store.

A tinkling bell rang somewhere in the depths of the shop as he opened the door. It was tiny. Hagrid took up half the space at the front of the shop, even sitting in a spindly chair. Harry glanced at the counter that cut the front off from the rest of the store and leaned over it, peering at the slender boxes stacked in cubbies from floor to ceiling.

Actually, he couldn’t quite make out the ceiling. The building dissolved into shadow about ten feet over Harry’s head.

“Good afternoon,” said a soft voice.

Harry snapped his attention back to the floor. An old man stood before him, only half a foot taller than Harry himself, his wide pale eyes shining in the gloom.

“Good afternoon,” Harry repeated politely.

“Ah yes. Yes, I thought I’d be seeing you soon. Harry Potter. You have your mother’s eyes, you know, although yours are a bit brighter than hers ever were. It seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice for charm work.”

He moved a little closer. Harry stared back and refused to be intimidated.

“Your father, on the other hand, favored a mahogany wand. Eleven inches. Pliable. A little more power and excellent for transfiguration. Well, I say your father favored it—it’s really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course.”

About two dozen questions were tumbling around Harry’s head now, but Mr. Ollivander seemed content to talk, and people often gave up information when you let them ramble, so Harry didn’t say anything. Also, his ignorance rule.

“And that’s where…” Ollivander reached out one slender finger. He’d come around the counter, somehow, without Harry noticing. The finger landed on the thin silver lightning-bolt-shaped scar on Harry’s forehead. “I’m sorry to say I sold the wand that did it,” he said softly. “Thirteen and a half inches. Yes. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands… well, if I’d known what that wand was going out in the world to do…”

He shook his head and spotted Hagrid.

Harry slipped happily off to the side.

“Rubeus! Rubeus Hagrid! How nice to see you again… Oak, sixteen inches, rather bendy, wasn’t it?”

“It was, sir, yes,” Hagrid said.

“Good wand, that one. But I suppose they snapped it in half when you were expelled?” Ollivander was suddenly stern.

“Er—they did, yes,” Hagrid said, shuffling his feet. “But I’ve still got the pieces,” he added brightly.

“But you don’t use them?” said Ollivander.

“No, sir, definitely not.” Harry noticed Hagrid’s hand going to the pocket with the pink umbrella.

“Hmmmm.” Mr. Ollivander turned away from Hagrid with one last piercing look. “Well, then. Mr. Potter… Let’s see. Which is your wand arm?”

“I’m—ambidextrous.” Technically not true, but the Sisters and the public school had taped his left hand to the table and forced him to learn with his right, so he was equally good with both hands now.

“How _interesting_. Ambidextrous casters often require woods with two wands, or double-stranded cores. Oooh, you’ll be a tricky customer.” Mr. Ollivander didn’t sound upset by this. The opposite, actually. He whipped out a tape measure and started measuring Harry’s body. Shoulder to wrist, shoulder to elbow, fingertips to floor, kneecap to kneecap, toe to heel, hip to floor… “Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Mr. Potter. We use unicorn hairs, dragon heartstrings, and phoenix feathers. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two phoenixes, unicorns, or dragons are the same. And of course, you never get such good results with another wizard’s wand… unless you are one of the _rare_ cases of a wand choosing a new owner. Hm.”

Harry realized the tape measure, which for some reason was focused on the distance between his nostrils, was doing this on its own. Mr. Ollivander was flying up and down the shelves, plucking boxes down seemingly at random.

“That will do,” he said, and the tape crumpled to the floor. “Here you are, Mr. Potter, beechwood and dragon heartstring, nine inches, nice and flexible, give it a wave.”

Harry picked up the wand and waved it, feeling silly. It was snatched from his hand almost at once. “No, no, not that one. Avoid beech, then. Maple and phoenix feather, seven inches, quite whippy, try—”

This wand produced a shriek that set Harry’s teeth on edge. He dropped the wand on reflex. Mr. Ollivander caught it in its box and the shriek cut out.

“Ah, we’ll avoid _that_ then—ebony and two unicorn hairs, try—”

Harry waved the ebony wand. Several boxes still on the shelves shot off with the speed of baseballs and clattered to the floor.

Mr. Ollivander snatched the wand back, smiling conspiratorially. “Tricky customer indeed! We’re on the right track now, though, I believe, try this one, double wand woods it is…”

One wand after another produced either no result or something that Mr. Ollivander clearly wasn’t looking for. The pile of discarded wands on the table mounted higher and higher and Harry began to feel a bit sick. What if all his wandless magic had messed him up and now he couldn’t get a wand? Dumbledore had said that was unusual and Harry had no reason to think he’d been lying about _that_ …

“Here, I wonder… yes, why not—give this a try—holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple—”

Mr. Ollivander was trying to look casual but he was almost trembling with excitement as he handed the wand over. Harry frowned a bit and picked up the wand and waved it. Nothing happened other than a faint warmth in his fingers.

“Ah… how strange.” Mr. Ollivander took the wand back.

“Sorry, sir… what’s strange?” Harry said.

“As it happens, Mr. Potter, the phoenix whose tail feather resides in the core of this wand gave another feather. Just… one other. And its brother… why, its brother gave you that scar.”

Harry’s eyebrows rose. “So you thought I’d get the matching wand to Tom Riddle?”

“Spoken with Dumbledore, have you?” Mr. Ollivander said knowingly. “Most people refer to him as Voldemort nowadays, Mr. Potter, or You-Know-Who still. His identity as Tom Riddle was a secret until you defeated him. And yes, I rather suspected you might be destined for that wand… but it seems it is not to be. No matter: I’ve never not found a wand!”

The selection changed a bit after that, including more wands with two woods or double cores. Harry rolled his eyes behind Mr. Ollivander’s back. The creepy old man was just trying to be dramatic and build up to the holly wand, and now that didn’t work he was trying for real. He didn’t seem any less excited, though.

“Here we are, why not… Aspen and walnut, dragon heartstring core, twelve and three-quarters inches, a bit rigid, try…”

Harry’s fingers tingled as he reached out. He smiled a little bit as he picked up the wand. Freakishness—magic—shot up his arm from the contact. _Yes_ , he thought, _mine_ , and waved it.

Silver sparks cascaded through the air.

Hagrid whooped and clapped and Mr. Ollivander rubbed his hands together in delight. “Oh, bravo! Yes, very good indeed… hmmm. Quite an interesting wand, that…”

“How so?” Harry asked, cradling it possessively in his hand. The wand wasn’t perfectly straight, and it had a handle of sorts that was just a bit rougher than the rest. The aspen wood was off-white while the walnut was a dark brown, and they twisted and wrapped around each other irregularly up and down the wand’s length. It was, he thought, the most beautiful thing he’d ever owned.

“Walnut prefers magicals of great intelligence, and walnut wands are most willing to produce any and all magics its owner wishes to perform,” Mr. Ollivander mused, eyes fixed unerringly on Harry’s eyes. It was a nice change from the Leaky Cauldron idiots who wouldn’t stop staring at his scar. “The dragon heartstring there came from a particularly nasty Hebridean Black. And aspen wands, it is said, favor those of great ambition and vision. Revolutionaries.”

Harry smiled. He forgot, for a second, to hide behind any masks at all, and Mr. Ollivander’s expression sharpened suddenly, peering at him. Harry caught his mistake and blinked away all his thoughts behind a bland smile. “Thank you, sir,” he said.

“Seven galleons, please,” Mr. Ollivander said.

He took the coins from Harry and slid them away behind the register, and his eyes didn’t leave Harry’s the whole time. “I think we can expect great things from you, Mr. Potter. That is an unusually powerful wand, and I suspect it has chosen an unusually powerful wizard… yes, Mr. Potter, I do look forward to hearing of your exploits.”

With that, he bowed them from the shop.

“Aspen and walnut, huh,” Hagrid said. “Interestin’ combination, that. I’ve not seen many two-wood wands… Double core’s a bit more common…”

“It’s pretty, don’t you think?” Harry said, holding his wand out.

“Tha’ it is,” Hagrid agreed. “Eh… Oh, righ’. Professor Dumbledore said ter send yeh back ter the orphanage, so why don’ yeh pack everything in yer trunk now?” Hagrid said, starting off in the direction of the Leaky Cauldron. “I’ll grab us a bite o’ early dinner an’ see yeh off through the Floo.”

“Okay.” Harry appreciated any meal that didn’t come from Sister Rachel’s tight budget and notions that children needed simple, healthy food. Usually that translated to bitter, tough, and generally disgusting.

Hagrid ordered them both a roast beef sandwich and something called a butterbeer, which he assured Harry had a bit of alcohol in it but not enough to be a problem. “Mos’ wizarding families serve it to their kids starting around ten or so.” While they waited for the order, Harry opened his plain trunk. It had what Hagrid called expansion charms on the inside, so he had a rack for books that he could lift in and out, a little frame to keep his cauldron from rattling around, and a big general compartment for his clothes. He tucked the box of writing supplies down under his potions kit and telescope. There was plenty of room left over for the rest of his clothes and few pitiful possessions in his room at Saint Hedwig’s.

Raza might be a problem. The letter said they could bring a cat, owl, or toad, nothing about snakes. He could probably fit in Harry’s trunk, but if they searched it…

Maybe he could get Raza to hide inside his clothes. The wizards’ robes were fitted but Harry could take his tatty Muggle messenger bag on the train and hide Raza in there, under a few books. And he could look through his new books for the specific rules on pets at school.

Hagrid helped him wrestle the trunk and empty owl cage into the Floo, waved good-bye, and Harry threw down a pinch of Floo powder. “Cat Cottage, Broad Street!” he said, as Hagrid instructed, and then he was gone in a wash of green.

Mrs. Figg offered him tea. Harry sat and chatted with her for a while and never let her see exactly how bloody _irritating_ she was. Batty old fool—but she was his one connection to the wizarding world, so he had to be nice to her. By the time he left, he’d managed to get her to offer him the use of her Floo anytime and also let his owl and owl cage stay in her kitchen until he left for the platform, since an owl wasn’t exactly a common pet in a Muggle orphanage.

He hauled his trunk down her driveway, across the street, and up the longer driveway to Saint Hedwig’s. The sun was setting and his shadow stretched out across the yard. Two of the younger kids were playing on the swings. They stared at Harry until he sneered in their direction, and then both of them shrieked and ran off.

“What’s _that?”_ Charlie said rudely, yanking open the front door.

“My school stuff,” Harry said warily. He really did not want to do this right now.

“Oh?” Charlie got that nasty gleam in his eye. “School stuff, huh? Wouldn’t you like to go to your fancy-schmancy boarding school with mud all over your uniforms? Yeah, I bet you would, I can help with that.”

Harry rolled his eyes and concentrated.

The two crows he’d seen on the roof took off, circled, stooped, and dove straight at Charlie’s face just as he reached for the trunk. “Oi, gerroff!” he bellowed, and bolted across the lawn.

The crows retreated when Harry quit trying. His headache was back, full force, but it was worth it. “Thanks,” he called up to the crows, in case they were like owls and smarter than Muggles thought, and kept going.

No one else bothered him on the way to his room. Harry found the door untested and the inside the same as he’d left it. He locked the door again behind him and collapsed on his bed with a smile that he never showed around other people.

Magic. Hogwarts. A trust vault, all his. So many new _books_ , so much to learn, so much _opportunity_.

 _“What did you learn?”_ Raza asked, slithering out of his hiding spot under the bed.

Harry picked up the adder and let him coil on his chest. _“So much,”_ he said, and told the story of his day in as few words as possible.

 _“I do not like the sound of this Albus Dumbledore. He has far too much power over your life. Change that,”_ Raza ordered.

 _“I’m working on it. For now I’m just trying to get as much information as I can without him knowing what I know. You have to know the rules before you can play the game, and you have to know how to play the game before you can cheat,”_ Harry said. It was another of his survival rules.

 _“Very true. I am glad I was released by one of the more tolerable landplodders I’ve ever met_ ,” Raza complained.

Harry flicked the snake’s tail and got a swat from the adder’s heavy triangular head in exchange.

_“Magic. I suppose that would explain your abilities. I always knew you were better than the rest of these wormfood little morons.”_

_“I am, aren’t I?”_ That widened his smile.

 _“Does this change your plans at all?”_ Raza asked.

“ _Please,”_ Harry said, snorting. _“No. Everything the same. Be good, if not the best, in school. Keep my head down at first and don’t make any enemies. Get control over my own life, make allies, learn the system, find something prestigious and interesting and be the best at it.”_

_“And then...”_

Harry closed his eyes. There would always be the people with power and the people without—that was just how the world worked. All his life he’d been without. Controlled by the Sisters and his teachers and the Muggle government. But he’d known he was special, different, better, and this just proved it. _“Then I make sure I’m never powerless ever again.”_

 _“Good.”_ Raza sounded very pleased with himself. _“I’ve raised you well, hatchling.”_

_“You didn’t raise me. That was Serateri, I told you about her.”_

_“She sounds… not appalling. Someday we must go back there, and take what is owed you from the wormfood egg-family of yours, and find your first serpent allies.”_

Harry smirked. Revenge on the Dursleys was one of his long-held fantasies and magic just gave him the opportunity to actually go somewhere with it. That was going to be a fun day. Hopefully Serateri and Hessa and the rest were still around. _“Planning to stick around, then?”_

 _“As if I’d leave now. I’ve put far too much effort into training you.”_ Raza coiled tighter around Harry’s chest. _“No, this is too interesting to miss.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A Few Notes: 
> 
> The other children use "fag" as an insult leveled at Harry in this chapter and the last because they are immature and unkind children growing up in a rural Catholic orphanage in the 80s. It's an insult they would use, and I'm in no way condoning anyone ever using that slur 
> 
> Also, religion. In general, I like religion and religious people, and I think religion has had a significant net positive impact on society throughout history. However, *organized* religion has led to a lot of persecution and violence from all corners. I'm not trying to bash religion in this fic. on the other hand Harry is a child with accidental magic and a cold personality growing up, again, in a rural Catholic orphanage in the 80s. He's not likely to have had a very good experience with religion. 
> 
> Re the explanation for Horcruxes: obviously dumbledore is lying. i got the sense that Horcrux-making is a very arcane, dark, and littleknown branch of magic. They weren't going to explain to everyone that there's a ritual to split your soul and gain immortality because it would shock people and comfort them, but it'd be handing amoral would-be tyrants a really fantastic weapon, esp. if they were smarter about it than Voldie and hid their Horcruxes, say, under a pile of wards in the middle of the Nevada desert. or something. so they came up with a one-use spell explanation to keep people from going after voldie's special magic and explain what the heck Dumbledore was doing for all those years. 
> 
> and finally, the wand! i spent like, an hour going through the Pottermore wand woods page (here is the url if anyone's interested, it's actually really interesting: https://www.pottermore.com/writing-by-jk-rowling/wand-woods ) to find one for Harry. Holly is protective and matches with people who need help controlling their recklessness; phoenix feathers are powerful but Light. Harry is neither reckless nor good-hearted so it's unlikely the holly would've still chosen him. I wrote the slight warmth reaction because when the wand was made, it was made for Harry. Before Dumbles gave Fate a giant middle finger and changed the future. If anyone is curious about the aspen and walnut meanings beyond what's in this chapter, go to the wand woods page and read Ollivanders' notes ;) 
> 
> happy reading! i'll get around to answering comments soon. <3


	4. into the snake pit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a bit of confusion after the last chapter and i want to clear something up really quick: Voldemort is 100%, very much, never coming back, dead. Dumbledore was not bluffing or bullshitting. He dedicated years of his life to nothing but tracing Voldemort's past. In canon, it's implied that he did that tangentially to his duties as Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, Supreme Mugwump of the Wizengamot, and Headmaster of Hogwarts, not to mention being Fudge's unofficial political advisor up until at least first year, after which it appears Lucius Malfoy edged him out. That is basically 3-4 jobs, at the same time. And he chased memories and records while doing all that. In this AU, he took time off and did NOTHING but chase Voldemort until 1988, at which point he destroyed the last Horcrux and broke Voldie's soul's last earthly tie. This AU will have serious political ramifications from his success. It's not the same Ministry, the political climate is different, Dumbledore's position is different, and there will be other antagonists and plotlines then the defeating-Voldemort one. I do actually know where this is going, but it's going to be more work than adapting and mostly sticking to existing canon like in S&S. I just wanted to make very extra sure we cleared that up before we go any farther ;) happy reading!

Introducing Raza to the owl the next morning was an experience.

Harry named the owl Aoife. According to one of his history books, Aífe was the name of a Celtic warrior-witch. She fought the Muggle general Cu Chulainn, but he tricked her and forced her into a contractual marriage. Aífe bore him a halfblood son and raised the boy, secretly, according to wizarding traditions, until he was seven years old. The boy then traveled in secret to Ireland and attempted to kill his father in his mother’s name but failed and died, as he was too young to truly resist a Muggle, since wands were still rather crude in that era. The blood of their son broke the marriage contract, and Aífe spent the next twenty years of her life conspiring with Cu Chulainn’s enemies to arrange for his death, finally shapeshifting into a raven and landing on his shoulder as he stood near death. The history book said it was rumored Aífe told Cu Chulainn who had arranged his downfall and why, and that the shock stopped his heart when the great warrior might have kept fighting, but that was only hearsay, as Aífe had become a hermit afterward and spoken to few people before her death. The modernized name, Aoife, was a fitting name for the fierce and beautiful snowy owl.

Then again, her fierceness was kind of a problem when it came to Harry’s other animal companion.

He sat on his bed, holding Aoife, and talked to her until she was drowsy and calm.

Then he called Raza out from under the bed.

Aoife switched instantly into threat mode, spreading her wings, fluffing all her feathers, and making a creepy strangled sort of hissing noise. She also hopped onto Harry’s knees, quite clearly getting between him and the threat. Raza bared his fangs in return, coiled to strike. He was a meter long and bigger around than Harry’s forearm in his middle, but an owl Aoife’s size could still do him a lot of damage.

 _“Raza, do_ not _strike unless she moves first. And try not to bite her if she does_. Aoife, easy, please. He’s a friend.”

Aoife hissed again and flared her wings.

Harry softly stroked her back. “Easy, easy… It’s okay…”

While he talked, he pulled on his magic and concentrated and tried to get his point across. Relaxation. Comfort. Peace. Not Harry’s usual states of mind, to be sure, but genuine enough for this.

Very, very slowly, Aoife relaxed.

 _“If she tries to hurt either of us, she’s dead,”_ Raza said flatly.

Aoife hooted angrily in his direction and retreated to the bed post.

 _“I think she feels the same way,”_ Harry said with a smirk.

 

It took the entire month of August for the two of them to get even remotely comfortable around each other. Harry spent the whole time reading. There was so much to learn. He’d been pretty accurate when he guessed this was a whole other culture. Harry would have to just not talk much for a while and figure out the social rules so he didn’t piss off anyone important.

The system was old, and complicated, and not very well documented at all, but there was something to do with noble families in the magical world. Something called the Wizengamot appeared to be the legislative and judiciary body of government, while the rest of the Ministry worked like the Prime Minister. Except somehow the Minister was chosen by the Wizengamot, and the Ministry in turn had something to do with the selection of Wizengamot people. Harry didn’t understand most of what he was reading but he got the gist of it—being on the Wizengamot meant you had power. How _much_ power could change depending on political opinion, your noble rank (which was barely talked about at all, like the authors assumed people would just know these things), your family and personal connections, and elections. Technically elections were only for the Minister and some Ministry positions, as well as positions of authority in the Wizengamot, but public opinion in elections tended to be reflected by what party was in power in the Wizengamot.

Presently, the Progressive Integration Party, or PIP, had most of the power. The Traditionalists had backed Riddle and the Conservatives pretty much just tried to stall everything as too radical one way or the other. After Riddle’s death, the Traditionalists were really, really weak politically, especially because the leaders of the most influential families among them were either dead or sentenced to life in prison. Like Lucius Malfoy, Harry was pretty sure.

Raza thought the whole thing was unnecessarily complicated. _“Snakes don’t need all these complicated systems,”_ he complained. _“We look after ourselves and our conflicts determine who among us is in charge. None of this bureaucratic wormfood.”_

 _“You need a different curse than wormfood, you use it too much_ ,” Harry said, just because the snake would get annoyed and go off on a rant and not notice that Harry wasn’t listening. Which he promptly did.

Harry grinned and went back to his book.

Twice he took the Floo back to Diagon Alley, and got ice cream while he read under an umbrella, or just wandered up and down the shops. He didn’t buy anything except a few more books that were referenced in the books he already had, but looking at the broomsticks and shops, and eavesdropping on people’s conversations, was a great way to learn about the culture.

 

On September first, he woke up at five in the morning, heart pounding. It took a few seconds for his brain to register why he was so excited, and then he launched off his bed with an uncharacteristic whoop of delight. Aoife startled awake with a screech that probably woke half the building, and Raza burrowed into the warm spot Harry had left in the covers with a stream of half-awake hissed complaints.

 _“Raza, get up, we’re going to Hogwarts today!”_ Harry said.

_“No, you stupid wormfood landplodder, I am not getting out of your nest until the sun is up! Go away!”_

Harry grinned at the sulky lump on his bed.

He was dressed and ready to go by six, curled up on his bed with a book about potions. As he’d thought, it was fascinating. The possibilities of poisoning people were definitely interesting, and some of the potions, like the liquid luck one, were dead useful. Although it would be a while before he was good enough to brew that one. The books he had only mentioned it in passing.

Finally, at eight, he thought he’d waited long enough, and stuffed the book in his messenger bag. He smirked like he did every time he looked at the bag. It was a pretty nice one, done in dark brown leather, and it had belonged to one of the older boys until a week ago. The boy in question, Lawrence, had walked up to Harry at breakfast, congratulated him on getting accepted to a boarding school, given him his bag as a gift, and left. The rumor mill exploded as to why a boy who hated Harry would give him anything, ever. None of the rumors came close to the truth, which was good, because Harry’s blackmail would be useless if everyone knew ahout Lawrence’s petty thievery.

Harry slid a book into the messenger bag, made sure Raza was complaining on principle and not because he was actually uncomfortable, and threw the last of his things in his trunk. Aoife hooted and vanished out the window when he told her to fly to Hogwarts. The owl cage barely fit in the trunk but Harry didn’t like the thought of hauling a giant empty birdcage through King’s Cross, so he sat on the lid until it closed.

Several people looked at him oddly as he dragged the trunk down the stairs. Admittedly, it looked pretty out of place among all these Muggle things. Harry glared at anyone who looked too hard at him, skipped breakfast, stuck his head in Sister Rachel’s office long enough to tell her he was leaving, and almost ran down the driveway.

“Good morning, good morning!” Mrs. Figg’s hands fluttered all around in the air when she opened the door, like birds that couldn’t find somewhere to land. Two cats made a break for it. Harry grabbed them and handed them back with a smile. _You need her, don’t say what you’re thinking, you need her…_

“Thank you, dearie—Muffin, Pockets, I have _told_ you not to go outside!—come in, come in, oooh I remember my brother’s first day off at Hogwarts, so exciting, you’ll be Flooing straight to the station, right?”

“I will, yeah,” Harry said. “I’m so excited!”

“I can just imagine! Would you like a spot of tea, dear, or a pasty?”

“No, thanks,” Harry said. “I’m so nervous I don’t think I could eat.” Also the smell of this house killed his appetite. He briefly imagined burning it down. Maybe once Mrs. Figg died or moved out.

“Oh, I understand completely, I can never eat when I’m nervous.” She offered him the Floo powder. “Off you go, dearie, best of luck this year!”

“Platform nine and three-quarters!” Harry shouted.

He knew what to expect and he _still_ stumbled forward out of the Floo, tripped over his trunk, and crashed to the ground.

 _“Graceful,”_ Raza complained from the bag.

Harry picked himself up, looking around. The station was deserted—no one was around. It also looked different from what he remembered of the Muggle version, the one time Saint Hedwig’s went on a field trip to London that involved the station. The stones of the platform was more like cobbles than concrete, and the space looked more like an old cathedral on the inside than Muggle King’s Cross. Also, there did not appear to be any kind of exit for the quarter-mile-long red train that sat quietly at the edge of the platform.

The whole place was quiet and still.

Slowly, Harry straightened his clothes and picked up the end of his trunk. Nothing moved; no one shouted.

Well, the letter had said the train left at eleven. He was three full hours early.

A quick investigation proved the train was unlocked, so Harry dragged his trunk inside, found a compartment at the very back, and shoved his trunk into the rack above his head.

 _“You should sleep_ ,” Raza hissed. _“If you are exhausted today will be even harder.”_

_“I’m too excited.”_

_“Try, hatchling, or I will sleep on your face for a week.”_

Raza had done that one time, and it had been awful. Harry quit arguing, balled his battered jacket up under his head, and lay down on the bench. It was padded leather and far from the least comfortable place he’d ever slept.

The smell of treated leather filled his nose. Harry shifted around a few times, sat up to look out the window even though it had been like five minutes and no one would have shown up yet, and lay back down.

Then he turned over.

The next thing he knew, Raza was urgently hissing in his ear.

Harry sat bolt upright with a yelp. Raza went flying. _“You stupid frogbrained landplodder! I was trying to help you!”_

 _“Sorry,”_ Harry said.

Raza huffed. _“As you should be. I’m going back in the bag. There are other landplodders arriving, and some in the train already.”_

 _“Thanks for the warning,”_ Harry said to his twitching messenger bag. All he got in return was a wordless noise of irritation. Snickering, he pulled out _A Beginner’s Guide to Transfiguration_ and went back over the first chapter. He’d read the whole thing but this was supposed to be one of the harder classes, up there with Potions and Charms.

Slowly, the platform and train began to fill up as the clock ticked past ten thirty and towards eleven. Harry eventually abandoned the book and stared, wide-eyed, out the window. Most of the families were wizards. He spotted a few in Muggle clothes. That was another thing he’d read about, mostly in recent history books. Some wizards and witches were born to Muggles, for whatever reason, and some old pureblooded magical families hated ‘Muggle-borns’ on principle. There had been two Dark Lords in the last century who wanted to try and enslave the Muggles and have wizards rule everything, Grindelwald and Tom Riddle. Gellert Grindelwald, defeated in a duel by Albus Dumbledore, was sitting in a jail cell somewhere on the continent, and Tom Riddle was dead, first by Harry and then finished off by, again, Dumbledore.

No wonder the man had so much political power.

Most of the recent history books talked about Dumbledore like he made rainbows appear just by speaking. They also treated Muggles like they were no different from wizards and said all of Riddle’s supporters had been power-hungry serial killing madmen. Harry hadn’t met that many magicals, so he couldn’t say, but he’d be really disappointed if they were narrow-minded, stupid, fearful, and violent like Muggles. He also found it a little weird to think that that many people had apparently been sadistic mass murderers, but maybe magic made you more prone to being crazy, who knew?

On the platform, no one was making an effort to talk to the Muggle families, but no one was visibly making fun of them or excluding them, either. Harry saw one boy hug his obviously Muggle mother good-bye. She squinted hesitantly at the train but seemed to be taking everything in stride. He scowled. So not _all_ Muggles flipped out when they found out their kids were freaks. Why couldn’t he have gotten that lucky?

A large and colorfully-dressed family of redheads cut off his view of the Muggleborn boy, chattering happily. Harry counted four boys in robes and a little girl clinging to her mum’s hand. The oldest boy was already wearing Hogwarts robes in shiny black silk with some kind of badge on his chest, and appeared to be lecturing two other boys, who looked like twins.

Another thing he’d never have.

Harry looked away from them. He didn’t need a family. He’d long ago squashed whatever part of him wanted or needed other people and he was fine on his own now, preferred it actually, even if it was a little sad to see what he might’ve had in a different life. If his childhood hadn’t taught him that people were stupid and caring was a weakness.

“E-excuse me. D’you mind if I…”

Harry turned around. A _yes, actually, I do mind_ was on the tip of his tongue when the nervous, pudgy boy in the door of his compartment said in a rush, “Oh, my name’s Neville Longbottom, sorry, I always forget.”

Longbottom. A pureblood name, and an old one. Harry had the sense they were influential. And _this_ was their son?

He was worth a look, at least. “No, not at all,” Harry said. He cycled through a few different ideas in his head while Neville Longbottom hauled his trunk into the compartment. Quiet brilliant schoolboy might just scare the kid and cold don’t-piss-me-off-today definitely would, no matter how comfortable he was in that mask. Harry wasn’t very good at nice and friendly, but he figured now was as good a time as any to start. He closed the door while he worked on this, not wanting anyone to eavesdrop.

By the time Longbottom looked at him again, Harry was doing his best to imitate an unstoppably nice demeanor copied from Ivan Meadows in Muggle school. “Harry Evans,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“You, too.” Longbottom shook Harry’s hand a little hesitantly. His palm was sweaty. Harry sneakily wiped his hand on his trousers when he got it back.

A bit of an awkward silence followed. Harry cast about for something to say.

“Know what House you’ll be in?” he said finally.

This must have been the wrong thing to ask, because Longbottom crumpled. “I mean… My parents were in Gryffindor, they’re these incredible Aurors—like, the Auror Corps’ best—and Gran was a Gryffindor too, so my whole family expects me to go there.”

“You don’t have to go where your family went,” Harry said. “Right?”

“I guess not, but…” Longbottom bit his lip.

Harry leaned forward a little and tried to make his face do _concerned_. “Hey, it’ll be all right. I’m sure they’d be proud wherever you end up.”

“I’m not,” Longbottom muttered. He pulled out a toad of all things from his bag. “They thought I’d be a Squib for ages, until Uncle Algie dropped me out a window and I bounced down the road. Gran cried she was so happy. Then Uncle Algie gave me Trevor here as a reward when I got my letter—my whole family thought I might not have enough magic to come here.”

He sounded thoroughly miserable by the end of this little sob story. Harry was, frankly, grossed out by Neville Longbottom and his obvious _softness_ , but at least he didn’t seem stupid, and insecurity Harry could work with. The real test would be when Harry revealed his real name, and if Longbottom went all let-me-lick-your-boots like the people who’d recognized him in the Leaky Cauldron. If he handled that well, Harry might decide to keep him.

“Well, obviously, they were wrong about you not having enough magic,” Harry said. “Otherwise you’d never have gotten your letter. And Hogwarts sends letters to the… top seventy most powerful purebloods or halfbloods, right?”

“Yeah,” Longbottom said. Harry had known he was right but letting Longbottom confirm it would boost his confidence. “Yeah, that’s true... But I might be the last one on the list. And even then loads of people turn it down to homeschool their kids or send them to an apprenticeship.”

That Harry hadn’t known. Longbottom might be good for information if nothing else. “Who cares if you’re seventieth out of seventy? There’s other kinds of skills than sheer magical power. You can be good at… Potions, or Arithmancy, or spell creation, or setting up wards that tap into ley lines. Or you can study things, like, I dunno, research projects or whatever. Be a scholar.”

“I’m not smart,” Longbottom said. He pulled off a self-deprecating laugh with this and Harry’s respect for him stopped creeping downward.

“Neither was I, always,” Harry said. “I just read a lot and work really hard. You can, too, I bet.”

And there it was. A spark in Longbottom’s eye. Determination or something. That was good. Harry had been about to give up. “That’s true. I’m good at Herbology. Gran says it’s useless…”

“Eh,” Harry said, “plenty of things _look_ useless but aren’t magical plants used all the time in potions and healing?”

“Okay, I take your point,” Neville said. He looked at his toad for a minute and then put it back in his bag. Some rattling suggested he had a cage or habitat of some kind in there. “But enough about me, what’s your story? Please tell me it’s not as depressing as mine.”

Harry smirked, but only on the inside. A sense of humor and that stuttering had stopped. “You tell me. I grew up in a Muggle orphanage because my parents died when I was one and my Muggle aunt and uncle hate magic.” 

Longbottom’s eyes about bugged out of his head. “You what…! But… why weren’t you in the orphanage?”

“The what?”

“Oh. Muggle-raised,” Longbottom said. “Explains the clothes, I guess. There’s an orphanage. For war orphans. You know about the war with V-Voldemort, right?”

 _And_ he had the guts to say the name. “Yeah…”

“Well… A lot of his followers had kids. Most of them are unidentified. They started an orphanage for war orphans or magical children with no families. It’s kind of weird, Hannah says they should’ve been fostered but Gran thinks the Abbotts’ politics are stupid so I don’t know.”

“You don’t have to think the same as your gran does,” Harry pointed out.

Longbottom frowned a little. “I guess. Anyway, yeah, that’s the orphanage. Wait, _were_ your parents magical?”

“Yes,” Harry said.

“Yeah, there you go, that makes no sense. I don’t remember the name Evans, though,” Longbottom said suddenly as the train pulled out. “You’re not one of the noble families, are you?”

“Would that be a problem?”

“Gran might think it was, but I wouldn’t care,” Longbottom said. “The nobles have a responsibility to lead but that doesn’t mean we’re any better ‘cause we’ve got titles. Dad says we have to earn our titles.”

Harry grinned. “Well, it won’t be a problem regardless. I’m actually Harry Potter.”

Longbottom snorted. “No, you’re not.”

Harry swept his bangs back and showed off the scar he’d been hiding on purpose.

“What!” Longbottom choked. “I’ve been—sitting with Harry Potter and—oh bloody hell Gran’s going to _kill_ —okay.” He stood suddenly and bowed at the waist. “Good morn to you, Heir Potter. It is an honor to meet you. I am Neville Longbottom, Heir of Longbottom.”

“I… wasn’t kidding about being Muggle-raised,” Harry said. “So that was very dramatic but doesn’t mean a lot to me.”

This appeared to temporarily short-circuit Longbottom’s brain. He was still standing there blinking at Harry ten seconds later when a redhead popped into the compartment.

“Hey, I need somewhere to sit and… oh. Neville.”

“…Ron,” Longbottom said.

Harry eyed the redhead with some interest. It was one of the family he’d seen on the platform. This one was dressed in obviously expensive robes like what Malfoy had been buying, except rumpled in a way Harry was pretty sure Malfoy would never dare look.

“Finally made a friend, eh?” Ron said, gesturing at Harry without looking at him. “Took you long enough.”

Longbottom shrank a little. Harry hadn’t realized how much the boy’s posture had already changed until he curled back in on himself like he’d been doing when he first came in.

Well. If an opportunity this golden fell into his lap, he was going to take it.

“Are you going to introduce yourself?” Harry said icily. He leaned back against the window and cocked his head up a little the way he did when younger kids came to ask him about their schoolwork.

 Ron flushed. “I—sorry, I didn’t think you’d need introductions. Are you noble?”

“I might be, and then you’d have been very rude,” Harry pointed out. He was actually only kind of sure about that but Longbottom’s reaction suggested there were certain behaviors nobles were supposed to follow and it was some kind of huge insult to forget them.

“Yeah, but second-hand robes,” Ron said. “No noble family would be caught dead in those. No offense. I mean there’s nothing wrong with second-hand, just…”

“As it happens, I _am_ noble,” Harry said. He looked Ron up and down with a sneer. “And you may be noble in birth but you _definitely_ aren’t in behavior. Leave.”

“I’m a Weasley!” Ron protested. “You can’t just…”

Harry shoved him magically out into the corridor, sat up, and slammed the door. Then, for good measure, he pulled the curtain shut.

Feet stomped away.

“I think dear Ron’s gone to bother someone else,” Harry said lightly, turning around.

Longbottom’s mouth was open. “You—you just—wandless magic—and Ron—”

“Complete sentences, please,” Harry said.

“Sorry.” Longbottom took a deep breath. “I’ve just never seen deal with Ron so well, is all.”

“You know him?”

“From when we were kids, yeah. The Order of the Phoenix—you know, the ones who fought V-Voldemort—my parents were in it with his. The Weasleys have done pretty well for themselves since, especially with being Dumbledore’s allies. The dad’s head of the Department of Muggle Oversight. It doesn’t pay quite as well but technically he’s got the same amount of authority as the head of the DMLE—Department of Magical Law Enforcement, sorry—and the kids all do really well in school.”

“So Ron is a spoiled prat. Good to know.”

Longbottom winced. “I mean… the older brothers aren’t so bad. One of them’s off doing cursebreaker work in Egypt with Gringotts, I think he has another year or two of his apprenticeship, and the other one that’s graduated went to Romania to work with dragons. They’re all right—they grew up before all the… celebrity status and politics stuff kind of, um. Messed with the younger set.”

“How about the one with the badge? And the twins? I saw them on the platform,” Harry explained. This family sounded like they could be very useful, and he could repair the bridge burned with Ron if he put some work into it but he’d rather just reach out to a different brother.

“Percy’s the next oldest, he had the badge. He’s a prefect this year,” Neville said. “Gryffindor but there’s been rumors for years he was a missort and should’ve gone to Slytherin. He wants to be Minister someday.” Ambition—that, too, Harry could work with. Percy might be a bit old, though. “Then the twins are Fred and George. They’re the family black sheep; Molly Weasley wants all her kids to have nice respectable jobs but all they do is joke around and pull pranks.” He paused. “I kind of think it’s a front. They’re actually brilliant if you get them talking about things. They like to poke around our greenhouses when the Weasleys come over. They’re just not interested in school.”

“Huh. Families sound… complicated.”

“They are,” Longbottom said fervently. “Speaking of… oh, Circe, I’m sorry, I’ve just put my wand in it, haven’t I?”

“It’s fine.” Harry shrugged. “I never knew my parents, can’t be too sad they’re dead. I wasn’t joking about the Muggle orphanage. It was awful.” 

“I’ve, um. Never met a Muggle,” Longbottom said. “What are they like?”

Harry fought back a scowl. “I can’t say about differences between us and them because I don’t know many magicals but—all the Muggles I know are narrow-minded, stupid, and fearful. They hate and fear anyone and anything that’s different, especially me, with my magic and everything, but even other Muggles who don’t fit in. Sometimes for the stupidest reasons. My aunt and uncle abandoned me because magic scared them.”

Longbottom’s eyes were wide. “Oh… wow, okay. That’s…”

“Ever hear of the witch hunts?” Harry muttered. “Because they talk a lot about that in church.”

“It was their religion that drove that,” Longbottom said. “Right?”

“I think. I’m not very solid on magical history yet,” Harry said. It galled him to admit any weakness but Neville would be more confident if Harry wasn’t perfect.

“We’ll talk about it in History of Magic, I guess,” Longbottom said. “Emmaline Vance teaches it for the first five years. She’s a friend of my Gran’s.”

“Are you looking forward to it?”

Longbottom shrugged. “I guess… History doesn’t interest me all that much, really. Mostly I can’t wait for Herbology. And maybe Potions… I’m really clumsy but it might be nice to use my plants, you know?”

“I bet if you practiced you could work around being clumsy in Potions,” Harry said. “And yeah, that makes sense.”

“How about you?” Longbottom said.

“Potions. Maybe Transfiguration, that sounds interesting,” Harry said. “Oh, and History definitely. I only know the Muggle version, but just flipping through the books I bought this summer, it seems like the versions with magic are really different, and way more interesting.”

“I can’t imagine life without magic,” Longbottom said. “I almost forgot to ask—what House d’ _you_ think you’ll be in?”

 _Test time._ “Slytherin.”

Longbottom paused. “…really?”

“Yeah.” Harry shrugged like he wasn’t watching Longbottom the way Aoife did mice. “Ambition, resourcefulness, cleverness… It fits me.”

“Huh.” Longbottom was visibly struggling. “…That will raise some eyebrows, I guess. Harry Potter in Slytherin.”

He grinned, and it actually seemed genuine.

Harry studied him for another few seconds and then smiled rather abruptly. “Yeah, I bet it will. But let’s be friends no matter what Houses we’re in, okay?”

“Really?” Longbottom blushed. “I mean…”

“Yeah, really. Ignore whatever Ron said about you not having friends,” Harry said, thinking that it was probably true, and only made Longbottom easier to play. “I’ve known him for like, five seconds and even I can tell he’s a right prat. Deal?”

Longbottom beamed. “Deal.”

From there, the conversation was surprisingly smooth. Longbottom didn’t even complain when Harry pulled out a book; he just produced a plant from his trunk and started trimming its leaves with single-minded intensity. The silence was companionable. Harry found himself comfortable in someone else’s presence while reading a book for the first time he could remember. Then again, that was because Longbottom obviously didn’t have the guts to hurt a fly (yet).

It surprised him when the redheaded Weasley prefect knocked on the door and told them both to change into their Hogwarts robes. Harry hadn’t realized how much time had passed.

He and Longbottom hauled down their trunks, pulled out school robes, and tugged them on. Longbottom told Harry that the school robes were a somewhat modern design with buttons up the chest, long sleeves, and a split in the front to show the trousers worn underneath. Really traditional robes were closed all the way to the ankle and went over just your underclothes. He was quick to clumsily assure Harry that secondhand robes didn’t mean much.

“Do we… take our trunks?” Harry said hesitantly, eyeing the heavy thing.

“No, the house-elves take them,” Neville said.

“The what?”

Their journey off the train and onto the platform was occupied with Neville explaining house-elves, which were apparently little creatures halfway between the goblins and the brownies in Muggle fairy tales that lived to serve wizards. He only cut off when a huge figure loomed out of the steam and mist on the platform bellowing, “First’ years! Firs’ years this way!”

Longbottom squeaked.

“That’s Hagrid,” Harry said. “The gamekeeper.” 

“Hey—Neville!”

“Hannah!” Longbottom grinned as a round-cheeked girl in the most stereotypical pigtail braids to ever exist bounced up out of nowhere and hugged him.

Another girl with blond hair and clever brown eyes followed. “Neville, good to see you.”

“Hey, Daphne. Guys, this is Harry…” Longbottom paused, obviously letting Harry choose his introduction.

“Evans,” he said. It would be hilarious to see everyone’s reactions to his real last name in the castle, and he’d already decided to keep Longbottom, and being the only one in on the secret would make him feel special. “Harry Evans. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“You as well. Daphne of House Greengrass,” the blond girl said.

The one with braids—Hannah—swatted her shoulder. “Stuff it, Daph. I’m Hannah Abbott, House Abbott blah blah blah. Nice to meet you.”

“He told Ron off on the train like it was nothing,” Longbottom said gleefully.

Greengrass’ eyebrows raised. “ _Did_ he.”

Harry stayed quiet as they followed Hagrid down a path away from the rest of the students. There were about seventy first years; he’d heard someone saying in the Leaky Cauldron that a few forms at Hogwarts were a little smaller than usual because the war slowed down birth rates. Longbottom related the story of how Harry dealt with Ron—“it was so cool, you should’ve seen how he just leaned back like Ron didn’t matter, and then gave him this _look_ —” and Harry let them talk about him like he wasn’t there. Easier not to commit some horrific social error that way. He still wasn’t sure that pretending to not be noble while meeting other nobles _wasn’t_ a horrific social error but Longbottom hadn’t said anything so he was going to roll with it.

“No more’n four to a boat! Hop in, now!” Hagrid bellowed, pausing at the edge of a lake. Black and glittering waters stretched out as far as the torchlight reached.

Harry, Abbott, Greengrass, and Longbottom ended up all in one boat. Off to one side, Harry saw a bushy-haired girl talking nonstop to Ron Weasley and two others in her boat, one a skinny boy with sandy brown hair falling in his eyes and the other a stocky kid with a sneer on his face. A flash of silver-blond in a different boat could only be “Malfoy, Draco Malfoy” from the robe shop. Hagrid was so large he had a boat to himself.

Then they turned a corner and Harry forgot to pay any attention to his fellow first years.

Hogwarts was a castle, like the books said, but no book could ever capture _this_.

Soaring towers and stone battlements and graceful supports and golden windows and—

Just seeing it felt like magic. Felt like _home._

“Amazing,” Longbottom breathed.

Harry couldn’t and didn’t tear his eyes from the castle until the boats glided through a curtain of ivy and into a tunnel carved into the cliffs Hogwarts was built on. They drifted forward a bit and docked at an underground beach.

“This way,” Hagrid said, already climbing a flight of stairs. A heavy oak door was set into the rough-hewn stone around them. Watery noise and shuffling echoed around the cave.

Hagrid pounded on the door. It opened at once.

“The firs’ years, Professor McGonagall,” he said grandly.

“Thank you, Hagrid. I will take them from here.”

The witch pulled the doors open wider. She was tall and thin, and wore wine-red robes and a pointed hat that looked like it wouldn’t have dared slump even an inch, much like the rest of her. “This way,” she said crisply, and spun on her heel.

A flock of silent, awed first years followed. Even the bushy-haired girl had shut up, finally, as they climbed flight after flight of marble stairs lit by steadily glowing white fiery lights.

The stairs finally ended in a room just barely large enough to hold all of them. The professor turned around. “Welcome to Hogwarts,” she said. “The start-of-term banquet will begin shortly, but before you take your seats in the Great Hall, you will be sorted into your Houses. The Sorting is a very important ceremony because, while you are here, your House will be something like your family in Hogwarts. You will have classes with the rest of your House, sleep in the House dormitory, and spend free time in your House common room.

“There are four houses, called Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, Gryffindor, and Slytherin. Each House has its own noble history and has produced many outstanding witches and wizards. While you are at Hogwarts, your triumphs will earn you House points, while mischief and rule-breaking will lose you House points. At the end of the year, the House Cup is awarded to whichever House has the most points, a great honor. I hope that each of you will be a credit to whichever House becomes yours.

“The Sorting Ceremony will begin in a few moments. I suggest you take a few moments to neaten yourselves up while you are waiting.”

She eyed a boy who’d managed to fasten his cloak under his left ear, and then Weasley, probably for the smudge on his nose. Nervous shuffles went around the room as Professor McGonagall left.

“What does she teach?” Harry whispered.

“Transfiguration,” Longbottom whispered back. “Apparently she’s really strict.”

Harry thought he liked her.

“I wonder how we’re going to be Sorted?” This girl’s voice was high and anxious. “Is it some sort of test?”

Bushy-hair started talking very fast about all the spells she’d learned.

“My brothers—you know the twins—they were going on about fighting a troll!” Weasley said loudly.

“Your brothers, the pranksters?” Harry sneered. “Really? You listened to that?”

Weasley flushed and glared at him. “Back off, Evans. How would you even know?”

“The Weasleys have _quite_ a reputation,” a girl with a black bob cut said. Her almond-shaped eyes narrowed as she looked at Weasley. “I thought you were smart enough to notice _that_ at least, but maybe I was wrong.”

Harry eyed the girl with the bob cut. She left off giving Weasley the stink-eye after he sputtered into silence, caught him watching her, and gave him a once-over as well.

Professor McGonagall broke the staring contest as she returned. “Attention, please. The Sorting Ceremony shall begin shortly. Follow me.”

Harry got into the ragged line behind Longbottom and in front of Ron Weasley, who was still breathing down Harry’s neck for the comment about his brothers.

Harry forgot to care, though, when they got into the Great Hall. When the book said the ceiling was enchanted he’d thought something like moving paint but _this_ —it looked so real.

Candles floated through the air over four tables full of students. They wore black robes trimmed in red and gold, black and yellow, bronze and blue, or silver and green, from left to right across the hall. A general rumble of conversation died out as the first-years came to a halt next to the teachers’ table.

In front of the teachers’ table, on a raised dais, sat a stool and an old, battered hat.

For a few seconds, they all waited.

Then a rip near the hat’s brim opened and it began to sing.

 _“Oh you may not think I'm pretty,_  
_But don't judge on what you see,_  
_I'll eat myself if you can find_  
_A smarter hat than me._

 _You can keep your bowlers black,_  
_Your top hats sleek and tall,_  
_For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat_  
_And I can cap them all._

 _There's nothing hidden in your head_  
_The Sorting Hat can't see,_  
_So try me on and I will tell you_  
_Where you ought to be._

 _You might belong in Gryffindor,_  
_Where dwell the brave at heart,_  
_Their daring, nerve, and chivalry_  
_Set Gryffindors apart;_

 _You might belong in Hufflepuff,_  
_Where they are just and loyal,_  
_Those patient Hufflepuffs are true_  
_And unafraid of toil;_

 _Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,_  
_if you've a ready mind,_  
_Where those of wit and learning,_  
_Will always find their kind;_

 _Or perhaps in Slytherin_  
_You'll make your real friends,_  
_Those cunning folks use any means_  
_To achieve their ends._

 _So put me on! Don't be afraid!_  
_And don't get in a flap!_  
_You're in safe hands (though I have none)_  
_For I'm a Thinking Cap!"_

Everyone began to applaud. The Hat bowed four times, once to each House table, before falling still again.

“So we’ve just got to try on a hat!” Weasley’s waving hands almost hit Harry in the head.

Professor McGonagall snapped out a long scroll. “When I call your name, you will step forward, put the Hat on your head, and sit on the stool to be Sorted,” she said. “Abbott, Hannah!”

Abbott practically bounced forward, sat down, and jammed the hat on over her braids. Then—

 _“HUFFLEPUFF!”_ rang through the hall.

Beaming, she jogged off in the direction of the second table from the left. As she sat down, Harry noted her tie and robe trim had already changed colors.

“Bones, Susan!”

_“HUFFLEPUFF!”_

“Boot, Terry!”

_“RAVENCLAW!”_

This time, the blue-and-bronze table second from the right burst into cheers.

The first Gryffindor, Lavender Brown, was Sorted a few kids later. Then “Bulstrode, Millicent” became the first new Slytherin. Harry frowned as the Gryffindors booed and Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw sat silent, even though they’d all politely applauded for every other Sorting, even those that weren’t theirs.

As the Sorting went on, Harry noted that some kids sat under the Hat for ages while others were Sorted immediately. A Seamus something was there for almost a whole minute before he got Gryffindor. The bushy-haired girl got Gryffindor in a little less, and the Hat sent Malfoy to Slytherin almost before it even touched his head. Longbottom ended up in Hufflepuff and seemed happy enough about it, sitting with Abbott.

Then, at last—

“Potter, Harry!”

The Great Hall exploded into furious whispers. _“The_ Harry Potter?” “Did she say Harry Potter?” “Blimey, I’d forgotten he’d be at school soon!” Harry caught a glimpse of Hannah Abbott gaping at him before he sat down and put the Hat on his head. The brim slid down over his eyes.

 _‘Hm, what have we here,’_ said a small voice in his head. Harry nearly jumped. _‘Oh my. Well, Hufflepuff is right out, you’d sell out your own mother if there was something in it for you, and I’d rather have a tailor attack me with a needle than subject the poor Gryffindors to you. Which leaves… Mm, no, Rowena would love you, but only because you’re such a fascinating subject. And… Merlin, I haven’t seen ambition like this in almost fifty years. Salazar will love you. Better be SLYTHERIN!”_

Harry could tell this last had been shouted to the rest of the hall. He pulled the hat off his head and stood and realized it was dead silent. As in, he could hear someone clink their fork against their plate silent.

Hagrid and Mr. Jigger really hadn’t been exaggerating.

His polite student mask didn’t slip. Harry replaced the Hat and walked off towards his new House table, moving at a measured pace.

Longbottom of all people was the first to break the silence. He began clapping loudly and glaring around at his table. Abbott joined in next, and then Malfoy from Slytherin, and then the whole green-and-silver table was clapping and cheering.

About half of Gryffindor was booing and he seemed to have given at least one staff member a stroke. Great start.

Harry sat down in an empty seat between the bob cut girl and the skinny kid who’d been in a boat with Weasley. Malfoy was across from him, and glaring even as he applauded.

Finally McGonagall snapped out of it and called “Rivers, Olive!”

There weren’t many more to be Sorted now. Harry clapped politely for each student and loudly for the remaining Slytherin Sortings, Emma Vane and Blaise Zabini, and only when the Hall quieted and Dumbledore stood up did he realize how _hungry_ he was.

“Welcome!” Dumbledore said. “Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words, and they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

“Thank you!”

He sat down smartly.

Immediately, all the eyes in Harry’s vicinity snapped to him.

“You told me your name was Harry Evans!” Malfoy burst out.

“I didn’t say it was the truth,” Harry said.

Next to him, the skinny kid snickered.

Malfoy sputtered. “But—but—you’re…”

“The Boy Who Lived, yes, I’m aware. No one will let me forget it,” Harry said drily.

“You’re supposed to be honest!”

“You’re the one who assumed people would just be honest with you, Malfoy, not me.” Harry was getting a _lot_ of appraising looks now and he pretty much just had to bluff this out. Spin it as some kind of calculated play to make Malfoy look bad. He didn’t want to make an enemy of him this soon but he’d do it if the alternative was admitting he had no idea what he was doing.

Fuming, Malfoy looked down at the table, which was suddenly groaning with food. Harry didn’t allow himself to do more than blink in surprise before he picked up a pair of tongs and grabbed a piece of roast beef.

“Heir Theodore Nott, a pleasure to meet you,” the skinny kid said.

“Pansy Parkinson, Heir of Parkinson,” said the girl with the bob cut instantly. Harry glanced at her and caught her tiny grin. She was keeping him from seeing a pattern _on purpose_ to see if he’d slip up when he didn’t know what any of the rules were.

This was already a bluff. If he stuck with it he’d end up making something up and hoping he did the right thing for his noble title. That or he could just—“Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived,” he announced dramatically, sticking his chin up in the air.

That got most of the first years laughing, one (Malfoy) glaring, and four watching him closely. Zabini, Greengrass, Nott, and Parkinson, at least, could tell something was off here. Harry ignored their calculating gazes and busied himself with eating like nothing was wrong.

Other introductions went around the table. Millicent Bulstrode and Tracy Davis seemed to have some kind of history. Bulstrode did one of the formal introduction things, although she left off the ‘Heir’ bit, while Davis just said “Tracy Davis” and fell silent while Bulstrode sneered. Goyle and Crabbe, both decent-seeming blokes but a bit thick, did the formal thing, and then Wilhelmina Hopkins and Emma Vane did like Tracy and kept it simple. Zabini just said “Yes, I’m from _that_ Zabini family” and kept eating, which everyone other than Harry seemed to find unnerving for some reason. Greengrass went last and did the formal thing, like Harry had expected.

“So, Potter,” Zabini drawled almost immediately. “Where’ve you been all these years?”

“Living with Muggles,” Harry said with a smirk.

This earned another round of laughter.

“Okay, no, be honest, Potter,” Davis said, leaning forward. “Where _have_ you been? A family like the Potters… you really should’ve been around the society events.”

“Not that you’d know what those are,” Bulstrode said.

Davis flinched back a bit.

Bulstrode was blunt and heavy-handed. Davis was weak, and showed it. Useful. “I told you,” Harry said with overblown innocence. “Living with Muggles. In a cave.”

“Fine, don’t tell us,” Parkinson said through more girlish laughter. Davis, meanwhile, couldn’t hide her gratitude that Harry had drawn the attention away. “How about your Sorting, then? That’s going to turn some heads. I think Snape almost had an aneurysm.”

“I was thinking of a stroke,” Harry said thoughtfully. A few quick grins flashed around the table and they took subtle glances at the staff table. Professor Snape, whose picture Harry had seen in a potion book, scowled at his plate. A very large man on his left laughed loudly enough to carry over the entire Hall at something a tiny man on his other side had said.

“Slughorn looks happy,” Parkinson noted.

Nott snorted. “And even fatter than at the gala last year.”

“Right,” Malfoy sneered. “At which you wore robes from, what, eighteen seventy?”

“Eighteen eighty, actually,” Nott said. His voice was drawling and steady, and only if you’d been sitting next to you would you have noticed his hands tightening into fists. 

“Better than _secondhand robes_ , at least. Though I must say, Potter, those turned out better than I was expecting. Must be the breeding.” Oh, Malfoy was really out for blood now. “After all, the Potters are nearly broke—” Nott twitched just a fraction—“so it makes sense you’d look good in thrift robes.”

“I’d rather have secondhand things, and take good care of them, than spend fifty galleons on a school uniform only to drip tomato sauce on it,” Harry said mildly.

They all spun to stare at Malfoy, who in fact did have a smear of red tomato sauce down his robe. He choked and started batting at it with a napkin.

Harry sipped at his water.

They left him alone after that, having established that he had teeth and wasn’t afraid to use them. Nott stayed silent too. Harry was pretty sure the reasons were completely different, just as Davis, Vane, and Hopkins had other reasons. Parkinson, Zabini, Crabbe, and Goyle seemed not to care about the likely non-noble status of the three girls, but Malfoy and Bulstrode obviously did.

All told, it was a chaotic mess of family disagreements, old insults, prejudices, and internal politics. Obviously none of them could be trusted to do anything without a good reason and spent most of their time feeling out others’ weaknesses.

Harry had grown up around snakes. He felt right at home.

Coming to Hogwarts didn’t really change his plans. He’d always intended to go to a prestigious school and collect useful people with valuable connections or skills. Coming here made that easier, if anything. It was an almost medieval system of family alliances and ancient traditions mixed with modern attitudes, all set on a shaky foundation. Harry couldn’t help thinking of the disaster after World War 1, when the winners kicked the losers with bad treaties while they were down and basically created their own future worst enemy.  

He smiled into his plate. Shaky systems were systems you could take advantage of.

 

* * *

 

Severus really, really wished he could get drunk at the feast.

Unfortunately, he had a reputation to uphold and an uncommonly small group of new snakes to terrify into obedience, so he couldn’t imbibe copious amounts of alcohol _yet_. After he’d dealt with the new students and shuffled off to his rooms in the dungeons— _then_ he could break out some of Ogden’s finest to cope with the fact that the Potter brat was in his House.

“So, Severus!” Horace, as he had no Head of House duties, was already on his third glass of his preferred brandy. “The Potter boy, eh?”

“ _Eh,”_ Severus snarled.

Horace laughed boomingly. Severus aimed his scowl at his plate so he didn’t traumatize the Hufflepuff first years too badly. “Here’s hoping he’s inherited his mother’s talent at our art!”

 _“_ Our,” Severus muttered.

“Oh, come off it, we know you like terrorizing the NEWT Defense students in your creepy classroom but Potions is still your art, m’boy! I know where your little lab is!”

Well, no, Horace knew where the _show_ lab was, not the one underneath it, or the one hidden a few passages beyond that. Severus had spent the majority of his life living and working in the Hogwarts dungeons. He knew them better than anyone else alive. Certainly better than Horace of the Candied Pineapple.

Severus’ lip curled at that thought. A _joke_. Maybe he’d had more to drink than he realized.

“Yes, indeed you do,” he deadpanned.

“See!” Horace waved a fork with something impaled on the tines. “See, Filius! I told you potioneering is his art!”

 _As if anything else could be_ , Severus thought sourly. _Youngest Potions Master in history. Although, were I to choose another art form, I would say irritating multiple generations of the Potter bloodline would rank quite highly._

Speaking of which, prefects Boyd and Pawcett were already collecting the first years. Severus watched them closely. This form would be particularly dramatic, like those for several years above. People didn’t tend to have children in war, or when they were dead thanks to said war. And in Slytherin, condensing the student numbers generally just led to heightened tensions, as there were no neutral parties to act as buffers. The closest to neutral in _this_ group were Vane and Hopkins, the purebloods from unnobled lines, Zabini, whose mother may or may not have been a serial murderess, and—no, actually, Davis didn’t count. She was a halfblood from an unnobled line, Bulstrode was one of the most mentally rigid blood purists Severus had ever had the misfortune of meeting, and their families had clashed in the past. Formula for disaster.

Then there was the Malfoy-Nott feud, the tacit Parkinson-Malfoy cradle betrothal that was never discussed again after Lucius’ incarceration and the fall of both families’ fortunes, the Greengrass’ unfathomable political agenda embodied in their daughter—all mixed with the Boy Who Lived.

Potter, at least, was quiet and contained during dinner. Severus had seen some sparks at first, as Draco, Parkinson, and possibly Bulstrode had tested his claws. It seemed the brat had shown a bit of spine and then left them to duke it out for the top spots in the Slytherin hierarchy. Had he been any other child, Severus would have approved of the common sense. Getting in the way of a Malfoy-Parkinson-Bulstrode political battle was plain idiocy. However, being Potter’s spawn, the boy was probably just confused into silence by the eighteen thousand layers of conversational subtext no doubt swirling around him.

 _Fuck_ , Severus needed a drink.

He waited until the first years had left the Great Hall to excuse himself. There was a staff passage between the receiving room off the Great Hall and the dungeons. He triggered the entrance and stormed down it, popping out less than two corners from his common room, not that the non-Slytherins on staff even knew where it was. One of Salazar’s more prescient safeguards built into the wards.

Severus was waiting in the common room when the first years arrived behind the fifth-year prefects like so many ducklings. Under a Notice-Me-Not, he lurked in the corner and watched.

Draco, predictably, had taken the lead. Bulstrode and Goyle bracketed him on either side, Vince trailing behind. Greengrass stalked along in their wake with Emma Vane and Wilhemina Hopkins attending her.

Interestingly, both Davis and Parkinson were watching Potter where he trailed behind the others, although with very different expressions. Davis had a strange sort of almost-gratitude on her round little face. Parkinson had the air of a predator staring at another animal and trying to figure out what the hell it was. That was—disturbing.

And Nott…

Severus, frankly, had never liked him. The Notts were not known for excesses of mental stability. The current Heir’s great-uncle had made Bellatrix look sane. The elder Nott was dying of curse damage in one of their manors, up to his eyeballs in wards and healing potions, which meant the younger one had been representing the family since he could talk. Severus believed firmly that that much pressure from such a young age was _not_ good for a child. It had cracked Walburga’s once-brilliant mind, driven Andromeda Tonks away from her birth family, and turned Theodore Nott into… well, whatever kind of eleven-year-old can lurk in a corner and look completely unassuming while also like he was seconds away from trying to kill everyone in the room. His attention was alternating between Potter, Draco, and Parkinson.

Also disturbing.

To put his headache off as long as possible, Severus saved his examination of Potter for last. The prefects were almost done with their introductory this-is-Slytherin-united-front-in-the-corridors-open-season-in-here speech when he finally braced himself and looked at the son of the woman he’d loved and the man he’d wanted dead. (Although not in the manner it eventually happened.)

It was harder than he’d thought.

Lily’s eyes, but not, framed under typically Potter hair and those appalling black glasses. Although, for some reason, the boy’s were broken at the bridge of his nose, and taped. Severus sneered. Careless with his things, then, and too idiotic to ask someone to repair them for him. He was small for his age, but not much, with a pointed chin and a pleasant expression that hadn’t slid once during dinner.

Were those… secondhand robes?

Severus frowned. _That_ did not at all fit what he’d imagined. Albus would, no doubt, have placed the boy in some appropriately adoring hedgewitch’s cottage, where he would be worshipped by the local magicals, protected by anonymity, and fed a diet of compliments and assistance until he was even more arrogant and egotistical than his father. In short, not at all the sort of person to wear secondhand robes. Finely tailored and well-cared-for secondhand robes, granted, but still previously worn, as anyone passingly familiar with magical clothing could tell at a glance. Repeated application of tailoring charms degraded the fabric. These were on their second, _possibly_ third iteration if Malkin had improved her wandwork since Severus was a boy.

An unpleasant bit of self-awareness brought his headache roaring to life. He had, perhaps, been a bit hasty in his judgment of the boy. Ten years of peace, teaching, political apathy, and privacy in his lab (as well as the absence of any tattoos on his skin, magical or otherwise) had let Severus begin the process of moving on from Lily’s death and his own role in it. He’d expected the boy to set him back quite a ways, possibly all the way to square one. It was… possible… that he’d been hasty.

Severus resolved to be equally as unpleasant towards Potter as he was everyone not his godson, and observe, and then judge the brat.

Time to frighten them out of their wits. Boyd and Pawcett would be watching for anything interesting they let slip in the moment of shock, as was Severus. Most students who went to Slytherin came to school already developing their masks. It was a time-honored ritual to force them to drop them, if for a split second, and see what lay underneath. Fear, hesitation, disappointment, excitement…

He dropped the charm and stepped forward out of his niche. “Welcome to Slytherin,” he rasped.

Ten children jumped and twelve pairs of eyes snapped to him. Potter and Nott had managed to avoid any kind of flinch. Severus watched those two and knew the prefects would be paying attention to everyone else.

Nott’s mask slipped a little. He showed a weird mix of fear, resolve, and resignation, no doubt all tied up in the fact that it would take him years to regain what his family had lost and hold his own against Draco.

Potter, on the other hand, didn’t falter at all. The infuriatingly childish expression—wide eyes, slack forehead—had apparently been glued in place.

Severus abruptly wanted to curse something into smithereens.

He repressed the urge. “I am Professor Severus Snape, Potions Master, NEWT Defense Professor, and Head of Slytherin House,” he said. Silky tones, dark glare sweeping over the first-years and finding them wanting. It was an entirely different tack to Horace’s routine when Severus was Sorted, but unlike Horace, he was not interested in befriending his students. Arm’s length was close enough. “Should you have… difficulties… during your time here, I expect you to first attempt to solve them yourselves, then find a prefect, and then if that does not work, to come to me. My door is always open to a Slytherin.

 _“However_.” The sudden ice in his tone had half of them wincing. “I also teach NEWT-level Defense Against the Dark Arts and engage in private potions research in my laboratory. These responsibilities are secondary to my duties as Head of House but they are by no means trivial. I will be _most displeased_ should you waste my time with petty, juvenile tantrums whenever you please.”

They looked properly cowed. All except Draco, the little twit, and Zabini, which wasn’t surprising because his mother was one of very few people Severus might _grudgingly_ admit to being unnerved by,  and Potter, who was becoming more infuriating by the minute.

Severus raked his gaze over them and upped the judging-you-and-finding-you-wanting aspect a touch. It slid off Zabini’s bulletproof ego like water off a duck’s feathers. “I will not sugarcoat things. Slytherin faces not insignificant discrimination from the other students at our fine institution. Suspicion will fall on a Slytherin whenever something goes wrong with no proof other than the fact of your House. Punishments meted out for a Slytherin in the wrong will almost invariably be more severe than they would for another student committing the same offense. Professors Sinistra, Vector, Akingbade, and Greengrass are fair. Many of the others strive to be and do not always succeed. Be particularly cautious around Professors Vance, Crouch, Pritchard, Macmillan, and Vihaan.

“The moment you were Sorted, you took up a share in the reputation of Slytherin House. For good or ill, when one of us triumphs we all triumph, and when one of us fails we all suffer for it. Do not get caught, attend in-House study groups for those subjects with which you struggle, and do not give the rest of the House cause to believe you are hurting Slytherin.”

He let the silence stretch and settle for a count of twenty, nodded once, and swept out of the room.

 

* * *

 

So that was Severus Snape.

Harry found himself smirking as the prefects directed them to their dorms. That whole scene had been planned, down to every pause and glare in Snape’s dramatic speech. It was all supposed to intimidate them, unsettle them, make them nervous so they’d work harder to fit into Slytherin and not cause any waves. Even Malfoy was quieter than usual as Adam Boyd led them back to the boys’ dorms.

“We usually have about twenty per year,” Boyd said, “but the war dented our population a bit and not everyone’s willing to send their kids to Hogwarts. You lot get two rooms of three beds each. You can sort out the split however you like. Once you claim a bed, your trunk will appear next to it.”

Sharing a room. Great. Harry fingered his wand and wished he’d been able to practice some of the basic jinxes he’d read about. Mrs. Figg had warned him about the Trace, and also mentioned that it didn’t work on some old family manors, like those his new classmates probably grew up in. He was at a disadvantage. And he didn’t like it.

Boyd left them standing uncertainly in the hallway. Harry glanced around. They were all eleven-year-old boys, for all Malfoy was some kind of disgraced princeling in this world and every one of them had grown up far too quickly. Eleven-year-olds unsure of themselves.

He leaped headlong into their hesitation. “Malfoy, c’mon,” he called over his shoulder, already opening the left-hand dorm and stepping inside.

Predictably, Malfoy snarled something inaudible and went straight for the _other_ door, leaving the rest with the option of choosing their side. Harry smirked as he _heard_ Nott, Zabini, Crabbe, and Goyle all pause in unison.

Nott’s quiet laughter broke the silence. He followed Harry.

Harry glanced back once, and caught Zabini looking him up and down with a sneer before the tall black boy stalked into Malfoy’s room. Crabbe lumbered after him and Goyle joined Harry and Nott with a sigh.

“I can’t wait for the pillow fights,” Nott said with a mean little smile.

Harry claimed one of the three beds in the circular room. His trunk appeared at its foot with a _pop_. “They’re sure to be interesting.”

Goyle stared at both of them for a few seconds, and then just grabbed his pajamas and left the room.

There was a problem. Harry’s only pajamas were hideous maroon flannels chosen for warmth rather than style. He wouldn’t have been caught dead wearing them outside his room even at Saint Hedwig’s and he didn’t feel like anyone seeing him in them here.

Nor did he feel like changing in front of the other kids and letting them see the scars that littered his body.

At least the bed had curtains around it. He could just brush his teeth and stuff in his school robe and change once he closed the curtains around himself, then change again before he got up the next morning. And then, next year, he’d buy a set of cheap but not-hideous pajamas.

 “You know, Potter,” Nott said, “that was pretty funny when Draco Malfoy of all people got tomato sauce on his plate.”

“It was,” Harry said, eyeing the other boy. “He doesn’t seem like the sort to spill his food…”

Nott laughed humorlessly. “It was especially weird because there wasn’t any tomato sauce on his plate.”

“Really?” Harry dropped his polite awed new boy mask. Raised his chin and an eyebrow in unison. “How interesting.”

“And he really does not seem to like you,” Nott said, with a smirk. “Surrounded by your enemies, the lost little lion cub all alone in the snake pit…”

It was really too early to play the Raza card. A meter-long adder would scare Nott into leaving him alone but Harry needed to do this on his own, first. Time to bluff a little more. He was doing way too much of that tonight for comfort but there’d been some clues. “I might be surrounded by enemies, but at least my family name’s not in disgrace,” he sneered.

Nott’s eyes narrowed. “…no, I guess it isn’t. So why didn’t you introduce yourself as a Potter, then?”

Because he had no idea how. Harry wiped the coldness away with an easy grin. “Well, Boy Who Lived is the most important of my titles, wouldn’t you think?” 

“It’s not official.”

“Yes, but it carries more weight than _Heir Nott_.”

Nott sucked in a breath. The earlier jab about disgraced names hadn’t been too direct, but Nott wouldn’t stop pushing. Looked like Harry’s guess was right.

They stared at each other for several long seconds.

With a shrug, Nott looked down and away. “Point,” he said, and the tension bled out of the room. Mostly. “Bathroom’s down the hall, I think. You’d best hurry. Malfoy can take forever in there.” He gathered his things and headed for the door.

“Nott.” The other boy paused with the door half-open and glanced back.

His eyes landed on the wand spinning through Harry’s fingers.

“Don’t call me a lion again,” Harry said in his coldest voice.

A smirk crawled across Nott’s face. “Trust me,” he said, “I won’t make that mistake twice.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a very different Slytherin than in S&S, as i'm sure you can see ;)


	5. traction

Goyle kicked Harry’s trunk the next morning. “Piece of shit,” he sneered. “What, you stupid halfblood couldn’t afford a decent one?”

“Pity with all your money you couldn’t buy more brains,” Harry said coolly.

“Shut it, Potter.” Goyle waved his wand threateningly, but he’d gotten too close and too careless. Harry snatched it from his hand with a sneer.

Nott froze halfway into his uniform. All the malice dripped off Goyle’s face, replaced by shock.

Whoops. Apparently this was his first horrific social mistake.

“I don’t appreciate weapons being pointed in my face, Goyle,” Harry said, and tossed the wand casually onto Goyle’s bed before stalking out of the room. His shoulder blades prickled but no spells chased him out.

Nott caught up to him on the stairs to the entrance hall. “You are really picking your enemies, Potter.”

“Whatever do you mean,” Harry drawled. Technically, it was sarcasm, but hopefully Nott might slip and reveal something.

“First Malfoy, then his vassal?”

 _Vassal._ If that worked at all like it did in Muggle books—“If one, why not the other?”

Nott shook his head. “Goyle’s going to remember that for a while, you know.”

Exactly how big an issue could it be? Harry had just grabbed his wand, for Go—no, for Circe’s sake.  

“You… oh. Oh bloody hell. You weren’t kidding,” Nott said suddenly.

Harry raised an eyebrow. “I don’t kid, generally.”

“This is going to be great,” Nott said, laughing. “A Lord, raised by Muggles, thrown in Slytherin. You really don’t know what you’re doing.”

“I know exactly what I’m doing,” Harry said.

Nott grinned at him. “Which is?”

“Thinking on my feet.” And he was, right now actually. Nott knowing this secret was—tricky. So far he hadn’t made any blackmail threats and Harry wasn’t sure it would matter, since his parentage was hardly a secret and only Goyle had kicked up a fuss over it. On the other hand, if everyone knew he was Muggle-raised, they’d know they could take advantage of him.

But he had nothing on Nott yet, so he was kind of helpless.

Harry _hated_ feeling helpless. A very large part of him was tempted to call Raza out of his bag, or let his magic loose on Nott to do what it wanted, but the first option would reveal an even _bigger_ secret and the second one had put people in the hospital several times. Also, Nott didn’t seem the type to be easily broken by fear.

They walked the rest of the way to the Great Hall in silence. It seemed an unspoken rule that the first-years sat at the end nearest the staff table, while the rest of the House didn’t seem to have age restrictions on their seating. There _was_ some kind of pattern to it, Harry thought, watching the older kids settle in down at the far end of the table, but it wasn’t your year.

Breakfast was silent too, until Tracy Davis walked in and sat down across from Harry.

Nott made a tiny noise like an aborted laugh.

“So, Potter,” Davis said. “Looking forward to any particular classes?”

 _Dueling club, so I have an excuse to hex you._ “Potions. And yourself?”

She preened a bit. “Charms, definitely, and maybe Defense.”

Nott watched them both closely.  

“Who teaches those?” Harry asked.

Davis leaned in like she had a secret, never mind Greengrass, Bulstrode, and Vane were sitting at the table now and could probably hear every word. “Tyrell Vihaan is the Charms teacher first through fifth year, and Crouch has Defense years one through five.”

“So two of the people Snape told us to look out for?” Vane said sweetly.

“We can still learn from them, Vane,” Nott cut in. “Vihaan chaired the Committee for Experimental Charms for sixteen years.”

Harry resisted the urge to stare at Nott. Harry was backing Davis because he’d seen her type a thousand times—not unintelligent, but a follower. She was looking for someone else to take the lead and be decisive, and protect her from the other sharks. Harry could offer that—but what was _Nott_ getting involved for?

It couldn’t be that Nott was trying to do what Harry was. Davis looked between them, and beamed, and started chattering about experimental charms while Vane sneered and went back to her conversation with the other girls. Harry listened with one ear and stored what he heard about this Experimental Charms Committee (really? The Ministry controlling the wizarding version of technological research?) while he turned over Nott’s behavior. The most likely explanation was that he was just trying to poke the beehive with a stick.

Professor Snape swept down from the staff table to pass out their schedules at the end of breakfast. He glared more angrily at Harry than anyone else, for some reason, like last night. Harry had never met the man in his life and couldn’t figure out what his problem was, but it hadn’t impacted him beyond a few extra glares so he ignored it and scanned the schedule. It was, frankly, a chaotic mess.

“How on earth do they schedule everything?” Davis said.

“Father tells me it used to be worse,” Nott said. “Dumbledore ran off to hunt Riddle down and left McGonagall in charge. She had enough common sense to hire multiple teachers for each subject—it used to be just one and each class only met once or twice a week, can you imagine? We’d have to do so much self-study…”

“There’s no way this works for all seven years, even with two teachers per subject,” Hopkins scoffed, the first words she’d said the whole meal. She’d taken a neutral seat between Davis and Vane, and been ignored by everyone.

Nott eyed her. “I think they usually pack the first-years’ schedule so they can hold our hands, and then meet less often second through fifth year to fit everything. Also, there’s an extra time slot, four thirty to five thirty, that the second through fifth years have classes in and we don’t.”

“Oh.” Hopkins frowned down at her schedule. “This all seems unnecessarily complicated.”

“I imagine we’ll get used to it,” Harry said.

Nott skimmed his paper. “We’ve got Transfiguration, Herbology, Charms, and History on Mondays. Two out of four bad teachers. Great.”

“We have _three_ free periods on Thursdays, though,” Davis said. “So much time!”

Harry planned to spend most of it in the library.

He’d gotten up early and made it to the Great Hall before most of his peers. It had been a great chance to watch them all coming in, but it meant no one had gotten a good look at _him_ before they were all walking to class.

Davis trailed awkwardly behind him and Nott sloped along at his side as they tried to make their way to class. Older Slytherins helped them out a few times and they actually made it without getting too lost in the one hundred and forty-two staircases. Whispers followed him.

“Did you see him?”

“There, by the skinny kid.”

“Did you see his scar?”

“I can’t believe he’s in Slytherin!”

“Can’t you?” Nott muttered under his breath at that one.

Getting to Transfiguration was a relief, if for no other reason than getting out of the halls. Harry sat down in the back of the class. He hated having people behind him, especially now that those people would have wands.

Professor McGonagall wasn’t  in the classroom yet. Nott elected to sit at the desk in front of Harry and Davis one two to Nott’s left. Greengrass sat with Vane, Bulstrode with Crabbe, Goyle, Malfoy, and Parkinson. Hopkins sat down in the classroom’s back left. Harry subtly angled his body a little so he could keep her in his peripheral vision and still see everyone else.

The door to the adjacent office clicked open at precisely nine o’clock. The same professor who’d brought them into school stepped out, wearing burnt golden-brown robes today. “Welcome to Transfiguration,” she said crisply, and came to stand in front of her desk while the door to her office closed on its own. “This will, without question, be one of the most difficult classes you will take here at Hogwarts. The theory of Transfiguration involves using magic to temporarily change an object’s structure. Matter, at its most fundamental, is made up of the same parts, which are themselves energy contained in incomprehensibly small building blocks. And what is magic but energy? You will learn, in my class, how to use magic to temporarily rearrange those fundamental building blocks and hold them in its new position. Transfiguration is both art and science, and it is, at every stage, quite taxing. There will be no tomfoolery in my class. Should you endanger yourself and your peers by disrupting the classroom environment, you will be asked to leave. Should this happen twice, you will not be invited back.”

Davis’ hand shot into the air.

“Miss…”

“Tracy Davis.”

“Yes, Miss Davis?”

“What about permanent transfigurations?”

McGonagall smiled. “Clever question. Permanent transfigurations will be studied only in your NEWT years, along with human and self-transfiguration, with Professor Nasiche Akingbade. They are _much_ more difficult. Any more questions?”

No one had any. She moved on to roll call and began delivering extremely technical notes. Harry was glad he’d spent so much time going over the first chapter of the Transfiguration book. He was actually able to follow along with the theory, kind of, and when McGonagall passed around matches and told them to transfigure them into needles, Harry was the first person to get it.

Nott looked at Harry’s needle and then back down at his own. _“Cosmete,”_ he said, prodding it with his wand.

The match turned a bit silvery, but it was still wood.

“You have to focus on what it is at the start, the stages it has to go through, and the end goal,” Harry said softly. “All at once. Then it comes down to willpower.”

Something he’d never been short of.

At the end of class, he had earned Slytherin five points for his success and for helping Hopkins, Davis, and Nott. Hopkins and Nott both managed a needle-shaped-and-colored bit of wood by the end of the lesson, and Davis had gotten the color down. Harry was assigned some extra reading and the others were all told to keep their matches and practice. They also learned _finite incantatem_ , which would end the transfigurations and revert the objects back to their initial shapes even though the magic hadn’t worn off.

“There are traveling displays of timed transfiguration sometimes,” Hopkins said on the way out of the class. “Where the exhibitor creates some kind of sculpture and does all the magic so precisely that the objects revert in some sort of order, and it falls apart or changes in sequence.”

“My great-aunt was one of the pioneer artists in that field,” Parkinson said, dropping back to join them.

Hopkins’ eyes widened. “You’re related to Katalya Leblanc?”

Parkinson smiled smugly. “I am, yes.”

“That’s so cool,” Hopkins said. “You’ve been to her shows, then?”

“Of course. I went to one in Hong Kong when I was nine that she worked on for like, two years, involving flocks of transfigured pixies…”

The next class was Herbology. They had to hurry down the staircase from the first floor, out the big front doors, and down to the greenhouses, and barely made it in time. Especially with the trick door that almost sent Goyle face-first down a gap where a moving staircase had chosen not to be.

After an hour, Harry decided he wasn’t overly fond of practical Herbology. The manual labor was fun in a way but he’d rather have studied the plants’ magical properties and uses than how to care for them. They had it with the Ravenclaws, and he’d spent the whole lesson scoping them out, but none of the eagles caught his attention.

In third period Charms, they didn’t even get to practical magic. Professor Vihaan spent the whole time lecturing on theory. He was a little dry and abstract for Harry’s preference but he supposed a good understanding of the theory would help him cast the spells. Plus, Vihaan’s obvious passion for his subject was contagious. The only downside was that he spent half the lesson staring confusedly at Harry while he lectured, like he couldn’t quite bring his brain down from the clouds long enough to process a Potter wearing a Slytherin tie.

Harry spent lunch reading the (dry, and painfully biased) history textbook. Nott lurked on the edges of the first-year group and endured Malfoy’s frequent barbs. Hopkins, Bulstrode, and Vane had devolved into a conversation that pretended to be about art and was really about insulting each other while Parkinson occasionally dripped gasoline on the fire. Harry figured he’d be well entertained in Slytherin for the next seven years.

Goyle made one comment about Harry’s clothes. Harry looked pointedly at the dirt smears on Goyle’s sleeves from Herbology and shut that down without having to say a word.

“Potter! Hey, Potter!”

Harry paused in the hallway. Honestly, you’d think the Slytherin third years would be subtler about slowing down to eavesdrop. “Yes, Malfoy?”

“Excited to see Vance?” Malfoy sneered, marching up to him and then past, so Harry had to catch up and look like he was following. Harry’s fingers twitched with the urge to slap Malfoy down with magic but he resisted. Too risky.

“Why would I be?”

Malfoy laughed at him. Nott watched from Harry’s other side. “Well, she knew your mummy! Mentored her in Charms research and everything. Pretty special connection, eh?”

“I’m sure she thinks so,” Harry said.

Malfoy almost stumbled. Harry smirked and helped the process with a nudge of magic so it looked natural, and then _he_ was at the front of the group. Davis trailed Nott like a lost puppy and he could feel eyes on him from behind, probably Parkinson and Bulstrode, maybe Greengrass.

“She’s going to be _watching_ you, Potter,” Malfoy sneered, recovering. “Better watch _yourself_ so you don’t cost Slytherin points.”

“So far, Malfoy, I’ve earned Slytherin seven points and you’ve done absolutely nothing,” Harry said. “I think I’ll be fine.”

“Draco, dear, come tell me what you think of my bracelet,” Parkinson cooed somewhere behind him. Malfoy dropped back with a scowl.

“…you really do not care, do you?” Nott sounded more than a little surprised.

“Why should I care about her just because she knew my mother?” Harry said. _Not like she ever came to see me, or looked for me_.

Actually, that was a hell of a question. If his parents were supposedly these big heroes, why the heck had none of their friends been able to take him in? Why his stupid awful Muggle family? Either someone had kept his family friends away or none of them wanted him.

“Most people would,” Nott said carefully.

“You thought I was _most people_ , Nott?” Harry hissed. A bit of the hissing sound of the snake language sneaked into his voice and he clamped down on his sudden, bright anger.

“You were never going to be _most people_ ,” Nott said.

True enough.

They walked into the Defense classroom at the head of the group of Slytherins. “Fill the front seats first, please,” the professor, a stern woman about McGonagall’s age, said from behind her desk.

There went his plan to sit in the back.

Harry unhappily took the front row seats on the right side. He was able to slide to the far side of the three-person table so he could turn and sort of put his back to the side wall of the classroom. Nott and Goyle sat at his table, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Greengrass across from them, Vane, Zabini, and Hopkins behind them, and Davis, Parkinson, and Bulstrode behind Harry.

The teacher stared at them all for a few seconds before she snapped out a scroll. “Millicent Bulstrode.”

“Here.”

“Vincent Crabbe.”

“Here.”

She went on down the list until, “Harry Potter.”

“Here.”

Professor Vance stared at him for several long seconds. Harry looked back with confusion touching the edges of his expression.

“…Emma Vane.”

“Here, ma’am.”

Professor Vance snapped the scroll shut and put it away. “Welcome to your first year of magical history. As you undoubtedly know, our history is long, colorful, and intricate. Many nuances have been lost to time and others exaggerated to the point that we can no longer easily tell fact from fiction. It is the historian’s job to pick apart the stories from the truth at their heart. It is the politician’s job to spin those stories into something that will remind people not to repeat our mistakes.” She smiled wryly. “Or something that blinds people to the truth, depending on the politician in question.

“Conflict has defined the magical world for all of recorded history. Conflict with ourselves, conflict with Muggles. Until the International Statute of Secrecy was signed in sixteen ninety-two, we were part of many Muggle wars and they of many of ours. Since then, wizarding conflicts have been affected by the need to keep them secret. We have magic, but it’s harder than you might think to fight an entire war without the Muggles catching on. Of course, Muggle conflicts tend to mirror ours, so they’re often distracted.

“Over your five years in my history class, we’ll cover recorded wizarding history up through the events of the war with Grindelwald in the early twentieth century, and the parallel conflicts in wizarding India and Brazil. Your NEWT History of Magic course with Keyon Greengrass will focus on the current structure and composition of our government, and the ways history influences the present. The format of this course is simple—I lecture, you take notes; I assign readings with accompanying questions designed to test both your knowledge of the content and your critical thinking skills. We’ll have two essays per month. We’ll talk more about the format of the essays when I assign the first one next week, but the gist is that you can pick a subject from the topics we cover in class and the readings, get it approved by me, and then write your essay.” She paused, looking around the students. “Questions?”

Harry found himself leaning forward slightly. This was _so_ much more difficult and more _interesting_ than Muggle history classes. Those were boring—just read the book, memorize the dates, and vomit it all up on test day, then forget it a week later. He wasn’t sure he liked Professor Vance just yet but he thought he was going to love this class.

Even if the book she’d chosen was the most obviously biased out of all five history books he’d bought and read since August first.

“All right,” Professor Vance said. “Quills out, please, and take notes. You don’t have to write down every word I say, but get the highlights, and I’ll tell you if anything is especially important.

“We’ll begin with the first recorded magical community, in Khanpara, which today is located in the Muggle country of Nepal.”

By the end of the class, Harry was actually nervous for the first time.

His classmates couldn’t tell him anything about the atomic bomb and probably had no idea Muggles had gone to the moon. On the other hand, they all knew about the Goblin Wars of the seventeenth century, they all knew what the Statute of Secrecy was and roughly why it had been created, they knew about other wizarding schools and Ministries and governments. In magical theory, he was doing about as well as they were, and he’d done the Transfiguration first. But this? 

Harry had grown up hearing a whole different version of history, and he was terrifyingly far behind.

They had fifth period free and the rest of the evening off until dinner at seven. Harry hung back and let the group of Slytherin first years go on without him and set off to find the library.

It took an hour. He refused to give up, even when he got stuck in a vanishing step and had to wait for one of the ghosts to bring the caretaker by. Argus Filch glowered and complained and made the whole area stink like mothballs but he hauled Harry out easily. Harry thanked him as warmly as he could manage and asked for guidance.

Filch frowned at him like a student treating him decently was a foreign concept. “This way,” he grunted finally, stumping off on bowed legs.

Harry caught up and walked next to him. “I’m Harry,” he said.

“Yeah,” Filch said. “I know.”

“How long have you worked here?” Harry said, as Filch triggered a hidden doorway without hesitation.

“Forty-two years,” Filch said, and there it was—pride. This grouchy, stinky, creepy old man was proud of Hogwarts and how long he’d worked there.

“I figured it had been a while. You seem like you know this place well,” Harry said, like he wasn’t paying attention to his words.

Filch stared at him for the rest of the walk.

“Here yeh are,” he said, stopping at a surprisingly unassuming set of oak double doors.

“Thank you, Mr. Filch,” Harry said with a half-bow. “I’d have been lost all afternoon if you hadn’t come along.” Been fetched was more accurate, by the kindly Hufflepuff ghost, but same difference.

“You brats are all the same,” Filch muttered. “Always getting lost and leaving your messes behind for me to scrub.”

Harry opened his mouth. Put together a few pieces of things he’d read about, and some comments Mrs. Figg made, and realized Filch must be one of the disgraced magicals born without magic. A Squib.

It seemed bizarre. More so, somehow, than magical kids being born to Muggles. Still. Harry bet no one had ever really been nice to Filch, and of course he’d be bitter stumping around a castle surrounded by magic he could never use. It was the opposite of Harry growing up in Saint Hedwig’s.

“Scrubbing sucks,” he said instead of _why don’t you use magic?_

Filch snorted rudely. “Like you’ve scrubbed a day in your life, boy.”

“Oh, loads of times,” Harry said offhandedly. “Sister Rachel was serious about manual labor and housework.” Of course, once he’d realized he could, Harry had just _convinced_ some of the other kids to volunteer for his chore shifts, but Filch didn’t need to know that. And he _had_ actually done a fair bit of scrubbing before he hit on that idea.

Filch huffed and stomped away.

It was a start, at least.

Harry pushed open the big wooden doors and stopped, feeling a slow cold smile crawl onto his face of its own will.

So much _knowledge_ , so many _books_. The stacks loomed fifteen feet into the air; the ceiling was lined with a combination of wood and stone supports and hung only a few feet over the shelves. Up here, in the front, the library was well-lit with a bunch of group tables available for study, but the stacks twisted and turned until the paths between them vanished into the gloom. It felt like a place he could get lost. It was practically alive with opportunity.

“Can I help you?” someone hissed.

Harry looked around for a few seconds before he spotted a vulture-like woman lurking near a desk off to one side. “I’m just looking for history books,” he said with a shy grin.

“This way.” The librarian, probably, marched past him without a second glance. Oookay.

She pointed him down a particular path in the stacks. “This is history, chronological and alphabetical within the year.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” he said.

The librarian left him there without another word. Harry frowned at her back. It would be really useful to have the librarian like him but she didn’t seem to like anyone.

Then again, neither did Filch. Everyone had a weakness.

 _“Want out?”_ Harry hissed.

An emphatic yes came from his bag. Snickering, Harry bent down and looked at some books on the bottom shelf while Raza slithered out of his bag. _“It is cramped in there,”_ Raza complained.

 _“They put expansion charms on the trunks, maybe I can learn one for the bag,”_ Harry said, spotting a book that looked interesting. _“Go and hunt or something, just don’t get caught.”_

_“I’m not some frogbrained idiot, hatchling.”_

_“I never said you were. Find me later, okay?”_

Raza snapped playfully at Harry’s ankle and vanished into the shadows under the shelves.

 

“It’s almost time for dinner.”

Harry blinked and looked up. “Hm?”

“Dinner.” The librarian crossed her arms and glowered at him. “You’re going to miss it if you don’t leave soon.”

“Oops,” Harry said, checking his battered watch. Eight fifteen already. “I, ah, is there a check-out system?”

“All of these?”

Harry nodded.

The librarian flicked her wand. All five books on the table in front of him closed themselves and floated neatly over to her desk. She busied herself swiping them through some sort of whirring bronze contraption built into the wall next to it while Harry packed up his cheap Muggle notebook and quill. It was a plain black composition notebook, unlined, and if you didn’t look too closely you wouldn’t notice it had paper instead of parchment. The quill didn’t work as well on paper but he figured that was just good practice and he’d never have been able to afford the fancy leather-and-parchment notebooks in Diagon Alley. As long as all his essays were written on parchment, he could take notes on paper and no one would notice.

“Muggleborn?” the librarian said, handing over a stack of books.

“No,” he sneered, unable to help himself. Bad enough he was related to the Dursleys at all; the thought of having them, or people like them, as _parents_ was nauseating.

“Muggle-raised, then. Oh don’t look at me like that, boy, you’re desperately cramming history on the first day and you’re in Slytherin,” she snarled, shoving the books at him. “I’ve not worked here for the last three decades without picking up on some things. Those books are a good start. Professor Vance doesn’t care about handwriting but she likes your writing to be concise.”

“…thank you,” Harry said, sliding the books into his messenger bag.

 

“Where’ve you been?” Malfoy said when Harry sat down. “Trying to fix up your robes?”

“Get new insults, Malfoy, it’s the first day of term and you’ve already worn that one out,” Harry said without even looking at him. One of these days he was going to call Malfoy Blondie to his face, but first he had to make sure nicknames wouldn’t land him in a duel to the death or something.

“Library?” Nott asked, quieter, with a smirk aimed at Harry’s bulging bag.

“No,” Harry lied flawlessly.

Nott blinked. Realized. “Prat,” he muttered.

_You have no idea._

 

Day two brought Transfiguration and History again. Harry had spent the night before poring over his history textbook and several others to fill in the knowledge gaps the textbook assumed students already knew. It put him a little behind in Transfiguration, since he had only skimmed the assigned reading, but he managed to fake it and McGonagall didn’t call him out. The effort paid off when he actually kind of followed Vance’s lecture in second period.

Third brought their first class of Defense.

All the Slytherins were looking forward to it and dreading it at the same time. Defense was cool. Crouch was not. Neither was the fact that they had it with Gryffindor.

Harry saw Bulstrode make a beeline for Davis once the smaller girl sat down, and dodged Crabbe so he could beat Bulstrode to the three-person seat. Harry slid into the middle one a half second before she got there and ignored Bulstrode’s furious glare.

Davis practically slumped with relief before she caught herself. _Weak_. Harry slid her a warm smile copied from an actor in a film. A snicker that sounded suspiciously like Nott came from somewhere behind him.

“Welcome to Defense Against the Dark Arts,” said a terse, deep voice. “Wands away and textbooks out, please.”

Everyone shuffled their books out of their bags while Professor Crouch stalked up the center aisle of the classroom and turned to face them from the front. He was tall, dressed in severe navy blue robes in some itchy-looking woolly fabric, and he looked even sterner than McGonagall. “For those of you who do not know: I am Professor Bartemius Crouch, former Hitwizard and later Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. I retired in nineteen eighty-four and took up the Hogwarts teaching post in eighty-eight, at Headmaster Dumbledore’s request. I will answer no morbid questions about curses taken or cast in my years as a Hitwizard, nor will I reveal sordid details of cases I handled in the DMLE, so I recommend you do not ask.”

_Well, you’re no fun._

“Defense Against the Dark Arts has long been a celebrated part of the Hogwarts curriculum. Every witch and wizard possesses a wand, which can be a tool for great good or an instrument of evil. It is an extension of ourselves that allows us to impress our will upon the world around us. When you live in such a world, knowing fundamental self-defense becomes necessary.

“The Dark Arts is a branch of the most vile and evil magic known to wizardkind,” he said, almost—angrily? “They corrupt the mind and soul until the practitioner becomes mad, power-hungry, and sadistic. They are, of course, highly illegal, but many relics and books of the Dark Arts remain in Britain, as evil or small-minded people hide them from the Ministry’s collections.” He glared at the Slytherin half of the room. “The campaign of the Dark Lord Tom Riddle, known by his followers as Lord Voldemort, was built on the power of the Dark Arts, but he was conquered… by pure, innocent Light magic embodied in an infant.”

Everyone suddenly tried very hard not to stare at Harry. Except Crouch. He stared without even trying to look like he wasn’t.

The silence stretched out to the point of awkwardness and beyond.

“However… others will no doubt do as he did, and use evil magic on those of us who would work only good,” Crouch finally started up again. “Therefore, we must be prepared to defend ourselves and our loved ones. At the very least, this class provides an exercise in applied magic, as it combines elements of transfiguration, charms, and other branches of magic with basic hexes, jinxes, curses, and defensive combat magic. Even if you never need to defend yourself with what I cover, you’ll improve your ability to cast spells in real time, and broaden your theoretical understanding of magic.” 

Harry sat back as Crouch started illustrating the basic wand movements for the Knockback Jinx on his chalkboard and discussing the spell’s history. He’d already gone over all this in the textbook. Crouch apparently liked to cover the material slowly.

The little introductory speech had been… decent. Harry was still confused by the difference between a charm, a jinx, a curse, and a hex. The book hadn’t been totally clear and he wasn’t about to _ask_ anyone.

Weasley grabbed his shoulder on the way out of the classroom. “Potter!”

It took all his self-control not to break the idiot’s hand. “Weasley.”

“You lied to me on the train!”

“Oops,” Harry deadpanned. “Let go of my shoulder, Weasley.”

“Stupid Slytherin,” Weasley muttered.

Other voices rang in his ears. _Stupid. Loser. Freak. Demon_.

Weasley yelled and danced back. “What the hell, Potter!”

“His hand’s burned,” someone whispered.

Harry walked away.

 

Nott tracked him down in the library. “You missed dinner.”

“How clever of you,” Harry muttered, nose deep in a book.

“That was a nice jab at Weasley.”

“I didn’t touch my wand.”

“Didn’t have to.” Nott settled back in a chair across from Harry like a king in a throne. The librarian, still nameless, glared at them but didn’t interfere. It was the second day of term and the library was empty. “You know, most accidental magic stops after you get your wand. It sparks out of kids ‘cause they don’t use it so it looks for any way out. Once you get a wand, your magic recognizes the channel, and settles.”

Harry sighed through his noise. “Is there a point buried somewhere in there?”

“Only uncommonly powerful magicals still have small bouts of accidental magic like that after they get a wand,” Nott said seriously.

Sensitive to jokes about his family’s money. Disgraced family name. On the outs with Malfoy, whose family wasn’t exactly on top of the social hill themselves.

Harry almost laughed when he realized why the pureblooded Theodore Nott had been trying to attach himself to the Boy Who Lived since the Sorting. Two days into term and he had his first connection. It was like the world _wanted_ him to do this.

“Maybe it wasn’t accidental,” he said. “Ever think about that?”

Nott’s eyes widened a little bit.

Harry sent him a thin, cold smile and went back to his book.

“Your family’s a Lordship,” Nott said suddenly. “Title of Lord or Lady for whoever’s the head of the family. That matters more than you being a halfblood to everyone except stick-up-the-asses like Bulstrode. You introduce yourself as Heir Harry of House Potter.”

“Parkinson?”

“Family’s Sacred Twenty-Eight. Technically, her dad’s a Viscount.”

Harry added Sacred Twenty-Eight to his research subjects, nodded, and went back to the book.

 

Nott waited for him in the common room the next morning, sat more obviously next to Harry at breakfast than he had before, and grinned evilly at Davis when she slid in across from them, Hopkins in tow. Harry wordlessly offered the girls toast.

Interestingly, the hand-burning incident seemed to have earned him a bit of… attention from the upper years. They’d been giving the first-years the cold shoulder so far, keeping the staring to a minimum, but Harry got a lot of subtle looks this morning and none of them were aimed at his scar. It was a step up.

“Potions today,” Hopkins noted as they left the Great Hall. “Just notes and brewing prep, since it’s a single period.”

“Slughorn favors us,” Nott said. “And we have it with the Gryffindors.”

“Dramatic,” Davis said with a grin.

“Should be. Potter, put that book away, you’ve been studying for Potions since last night,” Nott said, swatting at the textbook in Harry’s hands.

Harry frowned at him. “I need to be prepared.”

“You’re a _Slytherin._ ”

“He won’t take points,” Harry said. “Just single me out, as a test or something.” He’d seen how Slughorn looked at him in the Great Hall, like a spider did a particularly juicy fly. He’d heard about child predators every other week in the orphanage. Slughorn probably wasn’t one, given that he worked in a school and they probably checked for things like that, but he definitely wanted _something_ from Harry. Top of the list was his fame.

“Four galleons you’re wrong, Potter,” Hopkins said. She tossed her strawberry blonde hair and grinned at him. “House loyalty and all.”

Harry considered. He could afford it if he lost, barely, and he was sure he was right. “Done.”

Nott sucked in air through his teeth.

Davis didn’t seem to notice, but Hopkins looked a little surprised before she smoothed it away. “…done, then.”

“You say _so mote it be_ to seal a bargain,” Nott hissed as they took their seats in Transfiguration. “Not _done_ , like you’re taking the Yule cake out of the oven.”

“Muggles spit on their palms and shake to seal bargains,” Harry said, enjoying how Nott reeled back in disgust. “Be glad I didn’t do _that.”_

“I should be betting on whether you even survive this year,” Nott grumbled, pulling out his wand as McGonagall shut the door and called the class to order.

 

“Welcome to Potions!” Slughorn said jovially. Seriously, he was _jovial_. Harry had learned the word in a Christmas book and he felt like it should have been invented specifically for Professor Slughorn.

“Those robes probably cost more than my broomstick,” Hopkins complained.

Harry and Nott sat down across from the girls. The classroom was in the dungeons, but well-lit and spacious. Four-person tables big enough for four cauldrons and prep kits each were spread around inside with plenty of room between them. The Gryffindors weren’t even here yet. Probably avoiding what was rumored to be their least favorite class.

“And such a wonderfully small group, too! Now, don’t get me wrong, I do love the large classes, but it’s so much more pleasant when we can get to know each other a bit, isn’t it?” Slughorn said, waving his hands and beaming.

Harry began to rethink the not-a-child-predator assessment. Surely no normal person acted like this in real life.

The Gryffindors tumbled inside in a loud red-and-gold mess with minutes to spare. “Oh, good, there’s the rest of you, I was beginning to get worried. Why, I remember getting lost my first day here… But no!” Slughorn winked at the Gryffindors as they settled into their seats. “I mustn’t get distracted. Who here can tell me what this is?” he asked, holding up a vial of what looked like brown sludge.

No hands went up. The bushy-haired girl with large teeth looked upset.

“Polyjuice Potion,” Slughorn said dramatically. About half the class reacted somehow, including Nott.

“Ah, I see some of you do know what it is now! Polyjuice Potion, for those who haven’t read ahead _quite_ extensively—” another chuckle—“is one of the most difficult potions taught at Hogwarts. It is also restricted by the Minsitry because it allows the user, for one hour, to take on the precise form of any other magical or Muggle.”

Harry sat up a bit straighter. The things he could do with that…

“Then there is the Draught of Living Death.” Harry recognized that one; it was in the footnotes of chapter two of _Magical Draughts and Potions_. Slughorn held up another vial of something gray and sinister. “Once administered, it puts the victim into a sleep so near death as to appear dead to most forms of detection. The only known antidote is Wiggenweld Potion, which is exceedingly rare and has only been successfully brewed four times in the last century. Once by young Severus Snape, and twice by yours truly.”

He put the two potions aside and leaned forward in his armchair. Every inch of the man’s body language sucked them in, convinced them to listen, told them he was bringing them in on his closest secrets. Harry had spent his childhood studying body language and imitating it. He felt like he was taking a master class. “I show you these potions, not to frighten you, but to express upon you the _potential_ that a skilled potioner can unlock. It is a precise and delicate art, requiring finesse, patience, mental discipline, and dedication.

“The payoffs are enormous, but, I must warn you, so too are the consequences of an error.” Slughorn chuckled again. “Why, I knew a young man studying for his Mastery, who added half a standard measure of valerian root when he should have used a quarter, and would’ve blown up a block of Muggle London if not for his Master’s intervention.”

The class laughed. At a joke about almost blowing up a few hundred people. Slughorn was _good_.  

“Fortunately, my nephew Hesphaetor is alive and well and working in Diagon Alley, and he’s avoided any such disastrous errors since.”

“What potion was he brewing, sir?” Malfoy asked.

Slughorn glanced him over. “A creation of his own, in fact. One of the requirements for one’s Mastery is to create your own potion. The International Society of Potioners tests it, verifies that it is in fact the applicant’s own work, and approves it for sale with their stamp of safety guarantee when they award the Mastery.”

That all sounded like the equivalent of scientists.

“No more questions? All right, let’s take roll, and we can begin with the preparation for Friday’s first brewing session! Ah… Lavender Brown?”

“Here,” said a prissy-looking Gryffindor.

A minute later, a Parvati Patil responded to her name. Harry braced himself.

“And… my word! Harry Potter!”

 _Like you didn’t know I’d be here_. “Here, sir.”

“It can’t be!” Slughorn stared at him, astonished. “I’d completely forgotten this would be your year, dear boy… Got caught up in my research, I suppose! Merlin, but you have your mother’s eyes…”

“So I’ve been told,” Harry said. He had not, in fact, ever been told that, but Slughorn visibly preened under the confirmation. Didn’t matter if he was even right. Harry had never seen a picture of his mum, so he wouldn’t know.

“Ah, Lily Evans! Now _she_ was a dab hand at potions. Had quite a gift! I was devastated when she turned down the offer of an apprenticeship for her wedding, but war makes fools of us all… Or was that love?”

“Both?” Harry suggested with a sly grin.

Slughorn laughed. “Right you are, my boy, right you are! You’ve got your mother’s brains along with her eyes! I look forward to testing _that_.” Hopkins made a face. “Now, where was I… Edward Runcorn?”

“Here.”

“Emma Vane.”

“Here, sir.”

“Sally Withersporr.”

“Here.”

“And Blaise Zabini?”

“Here.”

“Wonderful!” Slughorn snapped the attendance scroll shut and set it aside. “Now, now, let’s see… Mr. Potter! Can you tell me the two key ingredients to the Draught of Living Death?”

The bushy-haired Gryffindor thrust her hand straight up into the air.

“Wormwood and asphodel root,” Harry said. He’d gone back over the footnotes in the first chapter of all his books last night after the librarian’s comment, and now he was glad for it.

“Oho, very good! And… let’s see… where would you look if told to find a bezoar?”

Harry smiled. “In the supply cupboard, sir.”

Slughorn laughed. It actually seemed real this time. The Gryffindor put her hand down, looking disappointed. “All right, where do bezoars come from, then?”

“The stomach of a goat, sir.” Why were the questions so easy? That had been in a list of safety supplies to keep in any potions laboratory in chapter one of _Magical Draughts and Potions._

“Indeed! Last one, my boy—what’s the difference between aconite and wolfsbane?” 

 _One is a plant and one is a potion_ , Harry wanted to say, but too much humor might irritate the man. “They’re… the same thing, sir.”

“Very good! Five points to Slytherin for preparation. All of this information, for anyone who didn’t know, can be found in the first chapter of your textbooks.” Half the Gryffindors were glaring at Harry now, especially Weasley and the bushy-haired one. “In the beginning of chapter _two_ , you will find the potion we’ll be studying today and brewing in the double on Friday. No, don’t panic, I haven’t asked you to read chapter two yet!” 

He beamed at the bushy-haired girl, whose hand was now straight up in the air again. “Yes, Miss…?”

“Granger, sir, and what if we don’t have all the ingredients in the potion? The first-year supply kits don’t include porcupine quills or snake fangs.”

“Well, you’ve evidently done the reading, I see,” Slughorn said.

“I’ve read the whole book, sir.”

Harry blinked at her.

“Impressive! As to your question, the limited supply kits won’t be a problem. We have a store cupboard, as Mr. Potter already pointed out, for slightly more unusual ingredients. Anything else?”

No other hands went up. Granger was already holding a quill over her fancy notebook, almost trembling.

“Very well. We’ll begin by turning to page forty-two, the Boil Cure Potion. Copy down the recipe. We’ll introduce you to potions formulae in fifth year, but for now we stick to recipes as they’re simpler to interpret.”

 

He spent that afternoon and the next in the library, buried in books. Davis followed him on Thursday and Harry tuned out her mindless chatter while she worked on the Potions short essay Slughorn had set them on brewing techniques. Harry had done his the night it was assigned.

 

“Why are we up here, again?”

Harry glared at Nott. _“I’m_ here because I want to explore the castle. _You_ are here because you followed me.”

“I thought we’d be doing something more interesting than poking around some dusty corridor near the east tower.”

“Do you know what’s _in_ the east tower?”

Nott groaned. “Only the hospital wing, and the nurse’s quarters above it.”

“See? That’s useful already. Let’s go find it.”

Nott grumbled all the way to the doors of the hospital wing. Harry looked at the symbol on the door, one of a strange staff with ivy winding around it. It looked familiar.

“The caduceus,” Nott said, glaring. “The line’s supposed to be a snake, but snakes are _evil_ , so they replaced it with the ivy about twenty years back.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “A staff and snake—that’s that Greek healer.”

“Asclepius. I see the history reading is paying off,” Nott said.

They turned away and started back down toward the ground floor. “I would hope so. What’s wrong with snakes? Even _Muggles_ use that symbol.”

Nott made a face. “Muggles? Really?”

“They messed it up and they mostly use the one with two snakes,” Harry said. “I think Hermes’ staff.”

“Idiots. Anyway, Salazar Slytherin was a Parselmouth. Snake-speaker. His heirs could all speak the language, and Voldemort was one. He… well, it was pretty bad before him, according to Father—there were loads of people who hated snakes and Slytherin—but since he was defeated it’s gotten worse.”

What a wealth of information. Harry himself must be a Parselmouth, which made absolutely no sense, because he was pretty sure the Potters wouldn’t be called heroes if they were Slytherin’s heirs. And the issues about being Slytherin might be worse than he’d thought.

“…clumsy idiot. And now I have to waste class time.” The pompous voice carried down the corridor from a side hallway Harry thought connected to the dungeons. “Honestly, Longbottom, _why_ couldn’t you follow the directions?”

There was no answer but the name had caught Harry’s attention. He sped up and turned the corner.

Neville Longbottom and another Hufflepuff were walking their direction. Neville was covered in painful-looking boils and his hands were shaking. The other one broke off mid-lecture and stared at the Slytherins.

“Longbottom,” Harry said with a slight smile. Longbottom nodded jerkily. “You all right?”

“Slughorn s-said the nurse can—can fix me up,” Longbottom said tightly. 

“Excuse me, who are you?” the other one said huffily.

“Theodore Nott, Heir of Nott,” Nott said, drawing himself up. He’d dropped the casual introduction from the first night and managed to look down his nose at the Hufflepuff even though Nott was shorter. Harry remembered how Parkinson introduced herself and realized she and Nott’s families must be the same rank if they used the same introductory format.

The Hufflepuff folded his arms. “Ernest Macmillan, Heir of Macmillan,” he said stiffly. Another of that rank. “You’re…” 

“Heir Harry of House Potter,” Harry said. He hadn’t wanted to rely on Nott’s explanation on the off chance the other boy was setting him up but a Hufflepuff wasn’t too big a risk.

“Potter!” Macmillan’s eyes about popped out of his head.

“Ernie, can we…” Longbottom waved a hand weakly.

Harry almost smirked. This was too easy. “Macmillan, look, you don’t want to miss class and we’ve got a free. How about you head back to Potions? We can walk Longbottom to the hospital.”

Macmillan paused. His eyes darted to Nott’s Slytherin crest. “I…”

“It’s fine,” Longbottom said.

“…if you’re sure.” Macmillan backed away. “I… will… see you around, Potter.”

Nott sneered at Macmillan’s back. “Stuck-up prat.”

“What happened, Longbottom?” Harry said, taking the boy’s arm and hiding how much even that light contact made him cringe. Nott fell in on Longbottom’s other side, hands shoved in his pockets.

“I… dropped the porcupine quills in before I took the potion off the fire,” Longbottom said miserably. “My potion—my potion exploded.”

“Aren’t we brewing Boil _Cure?”_ Nott said.

Longbottom’s shoulders curled in a little.

“Why not brew the potion ahead of time from now on?” Harry suggested. “To make sure you know how.”

“But that’s… not allowed.”

Nott and Harry rolled their eyes in unison. “So what?” Nott said. “Don’t get caught. I’d rather break a rule and work a little extra than embarrass myself in class.”

“I… maybe.”

His eyes went to the Slytherin crests.

“You think we’re setting you up,” Harry realized.

Longbottom winced.

Harry made himself smile warmly. “I promise I’m not.” _At the moment._ “How about I come, too? We’ll track down some abandoned classroom or something.”

“…really?” Longbottom frowned at him. At least he had the sense not to throw his trust around like candy. “Why?”

“Muggle-raised, remember?” Nott twitched a little—it was the first time Harry had openly acknowledged that around him. “I need the practice, too.”

Longbottom stewed for a few seconds. “Okay. Um… Saturday maybe? After lunch?”

“I’ll meet you in the entrance hall.”

“I, uh, can we meet—in the boys’ toilets instead? Or something. Ron and Seamus might… not take it well if I’m hanging out with…”

“A Slytherin. Right,” Harry said. It was the stupidest thing to brand a quarter of the student population as evil and Dark just because of a few psychos. “Toilets are fine.”

“Thanks.” Longbottom looked hugely relieved.

Nott strode ahead and opened the doors to the hospital wing for them. Harry led Longbottom through.

The hospital wing was clean and fresh-smelling. It took up a whole floor of the east tower, so it was circular. Twenty or so iron beds with crisp white sheets were arranged with their headboards against the walls; folded curtain stands waited in between them if anyone needed privacy.

“How may I—goodness gracious, child, what have you done?” The matron stepped out of her office and bustled instantly over to them. She moved so fast Harry barely got a look at her face before she was hustling Longbottom over to the nearest bed.

“Potions accident,” Harry supplied. “He messed up his Boil Cure Potion.”

“Of course you did. Stay there; I’ll need a salve for this. You two can go,” she said, barely glancing in Harry and Nott’s direction.

“Feel better soon,” Harry said with a smile.

“T-thanks.”

Halfway down the staircase, Nott broke the silence. “Longbottom? Really?”

“On the train, he used the same introduction as you and Parkinson.”

Nott shrugged. “Fair point.” 

 

“Free period before lunch today,” Hopkins noted, as they left Herbology on Friday. “I think there’s a chess match in the common room—should we go watch for a bit?”

“I want to prep for Potions,” Harry said.

“You can do that in the common room, Potter, come on,” Nott said. “We’ve got an hour free, and then lunch.”

Harry shrugged. He’d been avoiding the common room so he didn’t mess up socially, but if there was a chess tournament, then the odds of him having to talk to people were pretty low. Also, it was Friday, and he had the whole weekend to read ahead in History and practice spells.

“Paragula,” Davis told the blank section of wall that hid their common room. It slid aside and the four of them made their way inside.

The chess tournament was already in full swing. Harry saw the two fifth-year prefects frowning at a chessboard while ten or so other students clustered around and watched in silence. Four other games were going on around the room and someone was playing some kind of intense, haunting music that Harry had never heard before.

Hopkins immediately split off to watch a game with Vane and Greengrass. Harry found an empty armchair by the windows that looked into the lake and pulled out his Potions textbook.

“Swot,” Nott said with a grin.

Harry eyed him for a second, decided that it wasn’t some kind of hidden insult, and smirked. “Yes, well, I’ve earned more points than you so far.”

He was looking down at his textbook by the time he finished the sentence. A sudden motion in his peripheral motion kicked his heart into gear. Harry’s head snapped up and he shot out a hand on reflex.

A pillow stopped dead halfway between his hand and Nott’s. Fell to the ground.

Nott stared at him. “…good reflexes?”

Harry blinked the coldness out of his expression. “Thanks.”

This time, when he looked down at the book, Nott didn’t throw anything at him. Harry stared blindly at the page. He really needed to get that response under control. Fletcher Giles’ whole crew liked to follow their targets around and throw things at them, and Harry was the favorite target. They might throw anything from a pillow to a rock, and he’d gotten good at blocking on reflex when it was too late to dodge.

But reacting like that to a _pillow_ —it revealed way too much.

“Want to play a game?” Nott said. “I have an extra set of pieces.”

“Sure.” Harry would probably lose, having only played chess a few times before, but practice was the only way to get better.

Nott nodded and went to get his board and pieces.

Harry set his book aside. He wasn’t going to get much reviewing done, apparently, but he’d been over the potion about eight times now trying to figure out why things reacted the way they did and he wasn’t learning much else at this point.

While he waited, he sat back and scanned the common room. There were maybe fifty students on the bottom floor, talking and watching chess games, and another twenty or so up in the balcony that ran around it, reading or working quietly. The balcony was a safe area where no one really talked. On the other hand, the ground floor of the common room was basically a war zone, with words as the weapons. He didn’t know any of the upper years’ names yet except for the fifth-year prefects, but he could see how they jockeyed for good seats to watch the games, placed bets, and watched everyone else with shark eyes. He smirked to himself. It was kind of nice being in Slytherin. People called them liars, and they were, but no one pretended to be anything _but_ a liar. So in a way they were all up front about their own natures.

“Here we go,” Nott said, plunking down a carved mahogany box. “The extra pieces were my great-uncle’s. I wouldn’t listen to their advice much. He was kind of senile and he lost. A lot.”

 _Listen…?_ Harry didn’t ask—the ignorance rule.

Nott opened the box, set up a folding chessboard, and then shook out two sets of pieces. One was done in old, battered silver, and he handed the velvet bag holding them over to Harry. The granite pieces he kept for himself.

Harry was glad he’d played chess a few times before at the farmer’s market in Nup End. He could at least put the pieces on the board in the right order.

When the last one—a rook—touched the board, they started _moving._ Harry only just controlled his surprise. The pawns shuffled a bit and stretched, the queen toggled her head around as though scanning her troops, and the knights tossed their heads.

“ _Who are you, boy?”_ the king said.

“Only the player can hear his or her pieces,” Nott said quietly.

Harry tapped his fingers on the table. “Muggle chess pieces don’t talk. Who plays first?”

“You can.”

Disappointing. Harry liked to play second so he could see what the other player was doing. He shrugged, studied the board for a few seconds, and reached out.

 _“No, no, tell us where to go, you buffoon!”_ a bishop shrieked.

Whoops. “Knight to F three.”

Shouting insults, the knight jumped where he told it to.

They played three games. Harry lost all three, although he came pretty close to checkmating Nott on the second and third.

“Haven’t played much?” Nott said after the last one.

“Can’t you tell?” Harry countered.

“Practice makes perfect,” Nott said. “Hang on to the pieces. Chess sets usually match better if you play with the same one all the time. Who knows, maybe you’ll make them a little less psychotic.”

Harry looked down at the dull silver set. “They were yelling a lot of insults.”

“Like I said. My great-uncle was batshit insane by the time he kicked it. We’d better go or we’ll miss lunch.”

They went back to their rooms to put away the chess things—Harry sneakily checked on Raza, still sleeping in his bed—and headed up to the Great Hall. Their usual seats at the very end of the table across from Hopkins and Davis were empty. Harry half-listened to Zabini and Parkinson argue about some French fashion designer only so he would know who Claire Boivin was in the future.

Predictably, the Gryffindors were again almost late to Potions. Granger was the only lion to arrive before the Slytherins and she looked like she’d been waiting outside the classroom for a while.

Her eyes locked in on Harry the second he stepped into the hallway.

“You’ve got an admirer, Potter,” Goyle sneered.

Granger blushed bright red.

“People keep getting stuck on the scar,” Harry said.

Nott snickered. “But it’s so _dashing_.”

Goyle scowled at them.

“You shouldn’t make fun of your scar!” Granger planted her hands on her hips. “Potter, you defeated Lord Voldemort, that’s something to be _proud_ of!”

Now was not the time or place to point out that Harry really doubted ‘innocence and purity’ could’ve saved him from a powerful Dark wizard. “Right, something I don’t remember. Everyone bow down at my feet,” he deadpanned.

Nott, Davis, and Hopkins laughed. Even Crabbe and Greengrass smirked.

“Hey, leave her alone, you snakes!” This was Weasley, barreling around the corner with Runcorn and Finnegan in tow.

“He says _snakes_ like it’s an insult,” Parkinson said to no one in particular, twirling black hair around her finger. Dark eyes narrowed at Weasley.

“It _is._ ” Weasley scowled at Harry. “And you’ve stolen the Boy Who Lived.”

“Could you _get_ any stupider?” Nott said.

“Yes,” Malfoy cut in. “Have you met his father? I think the Weasels lose brains as they get older.”

Weasley turned bright red and tried to lunge. Runcorn held him back. A few more Gryffindors turned the corner and piled in with the other students, talking loudly and completely unaware of the tension. Harry tried to process how weird it was to have Malfoy come to his defense.

Well, no, the defense of Slytherin. Totally different.

The door flew open at exactly two o’clock. Professor Slughorn shouted from his desk for them all to come in. Harry, Nott, Hopkins, and Davis set up at the same table like on Wednesday, except this time they set out their potions kits and cauldrons as well as textbooks.

“Right, let’s not waste time! The Boil Cure potion is simple, but it has several periods in which you simply let it sit and stew, so you’d best get started!” Slughorn said encouragingly.

Harry scanned the list of ingredients. Cooking, along with raking leaves, was one of the few chores he’d never managed to get out of at Saint Hedwig’s, because the Sisters were always there. He hated it with a passion but he’d learned to always have all the ingredients out and know the whole process before you started. Davis, along with most of the other students, just started crushing snake fangs.

Malfoy and Granger were the other two who went to the store cupboard first. All three of them glared at each other as they collected ingredients and returned to their seats.

“You’re behind,” Hopkins muttered as Harry started crushing the fangs. She was already weighing nettles.

“Oh, are you the professor now?” he snapped.

She glared at him and looked back down at her brass scales.

Harry finished grinding the snake fangs, pushed them into one of the small wooden bowls that came in his kit, and started weighing the nettles. His secondhand scales rattled a bit, but if he crouched down and used his wand as a level it helped.

Meanwhile, Slughorn walked around the classroom, correcting people’s grips on their knives, warning them about errors, and dishing out compliments or jovial “oh, dear”s that only made people nervous. He spent especially long hanging over Granger’s cauldron and complimenting the perfect way she stewed her horned slugs.

Then he came over and paid Harry the exact same compliment.

He caught a glimpse of Granger’s frustrated expression right before Harry had to duck his head and make sure the horned slugs didn’t stew too long.

In his textbook, there was a section on shading. Apparently you could buy little telescope things with preset potions that you could look through to see if your potion was the right shade or not, and if not, how many shades off it was. A few kids had them but Harry could never have afforded it. He bottled a brown potion after an hour and a half that he thought was maybe a little lighter than the textbook said.

“How’d you finish already?” Davis hissed. She was still stirring a bit frantically.

Harry glanced at her and Hopkins and Nott’s unfinished potions. “I’m just that good,” he said lazily.

Nott snorted.

“Oh, most excellent!” Slughorn boomed as he hovered over Granger’s cauldron. “Yes, just… three shades off of ideal. Perhaps a bit too heavy-handed on the stirring—the shelf life may be shortened… but an admirable first attempt!”

Harry added _impatient_ to the things he knew about Granger.

He fiddled with his bottle and hoped he’d done decently.

Slughorn made some indecisive noises at Nott’s cauldron, nodded approvingly at Hopkins’, clucked his tongue at Davis’, and stopped when he saw Harry’s. Stared for a few seconds.

“Most excellent! Only two shades off—have you had prior potions experience?”

Now that was pushing it. “No, sir,” Harry said with a shy smile.

“I daresay your mother would be very proud.” Slughorn collected their vials of potion for grading with a wink. Harry pretended to care whether his mother would’ve been proud of him.

 

Longbottom quietly closed the boys’ toilets behind him. “Potter?”

Harry stepped out of one of the stalls. “Hi, Longbottom.”

“Oh,” Longbottom said, sagging a bit. “I thought… maybe you weren’t going to show.”

“Ah, c’mon, I said I need the practice.” Circe, he hated talking like other kids did. Harry much preferred how people talked in books, careful and precise. “I think I found a good classroom on the third floor. We can take some of the back staircases so no one sees us together.”

“Good plan.”

Harry poked his head out of the toilets, made sure the hall was empty, and waved Longbottom along. “How’re your classes so far?” he said as they walked.

“Okay. I like Herbology. And I was the first Hufflepuff to transfigure my match into a needle!”

“Great job!” Harry reevaluated Longbottom a little. Maybe he wasn’t magically hopeless—maybe his family had just underestimated him.

Speaking of which. “How are you liking Hufflepuff, by the way?”

“It’s—okay. Everyone’s really friendly,” Longbottom said. “They kind of have expectations, though. A lot of the time I’d rather sit on my own for a bit but everyone always wants to talk. This other kid, Zacharias Smith, he likes the quiet too, so we sit together in the common room sometimes and study. How’s Slytherin?”

 _Terrifying, lethal, brilliant._ “Eeeevil,” Harry said with big eyes.

Longbottom stared at him.

“I’m _joking_.”

“Oh.” Longbottom laughed weakly. “Sorry, I just…”

“Grew up hearing it?” Harry said.

Longbottom shrugged.

“I grew up hearing I was a freak,” Harry said. “Just ‘cause people say things doesn’t make them true. I really like Slytherin. In Muggle school, a lot of the kids just wanted to laze around. Slytherin…” No one takes anything at face value and it’s _awesome._ “We’re all really driven, you know?”

“That’s good.” Longbottom bit his lip. “Have people given you a hard time?”

Harry smirked. “More outside Slytherin than inside, actually. Weasley seems to think it’s some kind of personal insult that I ended up somewhere other than Gryffindor.”

“He’s always been a prat,” Longbottom agreed.

“How about your family?”

“They, ah… Gran _said_ she was proud of me but the letter seemed like she was kind of disappointed. Uncle Algie didn’t even try and hide it. _Failed to live up to our family legacy_ or some such thing. Mum and Dad wrote and they didn’t even mention it.”

Harry’s lips thinned. If your family was around, they _should_ care for you. Should, and too often didn’t. The Dursleys and apparently the Longbottoms had failed _that_ task.

But telling Longbottom straight up that if your family treats you badly then you could choose your own would probably be too much too soon. “They’ll come around,” he said instead. “And if they don’t, you can just prove them wrong.”

“I hope,” Longbottom muttered. “I mean… I love them, but…”

Harry steeled himself and patted Longbottom’s shoulder. Other people comforted each other with hugs, and he didn’t think he could bring himself to do _that_ , but a shoulder pat would be an acceptable second option. He thought.

It seemed to work. Longbottom stood up a little straighter, grinned at him, and asked what teacher Harry liked best.

They talked the rest of the way to the abandoned classroom Harry had found that morning. Nott had tagged along for the explorations, but after lunch, he just said “I’ll hang out with Longbottom after you make him less annoying” and disappeared into the dungeons.

“It’s dusty,” Longbottom said, looking around.

“Yeah, but… _scourgify!”_ Harry brandished his wand, relishing the feeling of magic flooding down his fingers and out into the world. It felt a lot like using magic had growing up, but with a wand it was stronger and easier.

A large patch of dust vanished.

“Wow,” Longbottom said.

“You try,” Harry encouraged. “Here, the wand motion is like this, a circle with a little left flick at the end…”

Longbottom frowned. _“Scourgify!”_

Some dust poofed up into the air. It might have helped a little.

He slumped.

“Try again. Flick a little harder and really _want_ it to happen,” Harry said. “Like you want to prove your family wrong.”

“Okay.” Longbottom took a deep breath. The same hard determination appeared in his eyes that Harry had seen on the train. _“Scourgify!”_ he said again.

His flick was a little _too_ strong that time but a patch of dust still vanished. Not quite as big as Harry’s, but it worked. “I did it!” Longbottom said.

“You sound surprised,” Harry said, summoning a grin. “You’re a _wizard_ , Longbottom, of course you did. Let’s clean this place up.”

They spent about five minutes casting _scourgify_ until most of the dust was gone. Then Harry shoved some desks together so they had a decent-sized workstation.

“Where’d you learn that charm?” Longbottom said. “We’ve only done _lumos_ in class so far.”

“Same for the Slytherins,” Harry said. He liked Charms well enough. Even the theory was really interesting, and it taught what he thought was the beginnings of the magical version of physics. Still… “Our class moves kind of slowly, so I’ve been reading ahead.”

“You should be in Ravenclaw,” Longbottom said.

Harry laughed softly. “I really shouldn’t.”

Longbottom looked at him for a few seconds. “Yeah, actually, probably not. Should we brew the Boil Cure or something else for Friday?”

“Let’s do the Boil Cure today, and then we can do Friday’s potion Wednesday afternoon, once Slughorn tells us what it is in lecture,” Harry suggested.

“We’d have to wait until after dinner, then,” Longbottom said. “I have Potions last period.”

“And?” Harry pulled out his cauldron and potions kit. He’d nicked extra ingredients at the end of class in preparation for his and Longbottom’s extra session.

“We might miss curfew.”

Harry stared at Longbottom for a few seconds and realized he was serious. “So don’t get caught.”

“Someone might see me going back in!”

“Wha… your House mates would _tell_ on you?” Harry said.

Longbottom blinked. “I mean. I broke the rules. It’s better to follow the rules. One of the upper years told Sprout about someone else who came in late.”

 _“_ Why _?”_ Harry said, shocked.

“He said it was ‘cause the friend was hurting himself partying with the Gryffindors, and Sprout needed to stop it.”

“Oh.” Harry frowned. “Well, that person was probably risking his sleep and grades, right? So the friend was helping him. You’re working hard to improve your classwork. If you explain that I bet anyone who saw you would get it. Hufflepuff is about hard work, right?”

“True… Maybe I’ll ask Zacharias to cover for me.”

“No, hang on, crush the snake fangs before you start the base brewing,” Harry said, stopping Longbottom before he lit a magic fire under his cauldron. “He’s the one you’ve been sitting with, right?”

“Yeah.” Longbottom got to work on the snake fangs. “He can be kind of stuck up sometimes, but he’s decent under all that.”

“That’s good.” Harry watched for a few seconds. “Crush the fangs harder. Smaller pieces means they dissolve better into the potions base. Look how fine mine are.”

“Thanks.”

Longbottom hadn’t been kidding about his clumsiness. He dropped things, knocked things over, and generally made a mess. Harry finally snapped at him to not hold anything over the cauldron unless he was willing to put it _in_ the cauldron after Longbottom dumped twice as many porcupine quills as he should have, turned it purple, and made them start over. Still, he worked hard and took corrections easily, and by the end he had a passable potion.

“This is pretty good,” he said, looking at it in mild surprise.

“Better than any of the Gryffindors. Except Granger.” Harry activated the built-in vanishing charm on his cauldron. It was old and decaying a little, and in class it took about five minutes to get rid of all the potion. New cauldrons like Longbottom’s worked almost instantly.

“She’s… interesting, isn’t she?” Longbottom said.

“Interesting how?” Harry eyed Longbottom. He was _not_ fond of Granger but most of the teachers already adored the know-it-all Muggleborn, and favored her shamelessly.

Longbottom shrugged and vanished his potion. “We have Herbology with the Gryffindors and… it’s the class I’m best at but she always has to answer _every_ question. I mean she’s really smart but…”

“But it gets annoying?” Harry supplied.

“Exactly.”

“Yeah, most of Slytherin feels the same,” Harry said. Of course, Bulstrode and Goyle hated her for the Muggleborn thing, but most of the House just found her annoying. There were four Muggleborns in Ravenclaw and another one in Gryffindor from Harry’s year, and in their shared classes, none of the Slytherins bothered _them._

“Figured.” Neville started packing up his potions kit. “Wednesday, then?”

“Wednesday,” Harry agreed.

 

“How was Longbottom?”

“He works hard,” Harry said, flopping onto his bed. Goyle wasn’t in the dorm, thankfully. “And he knows the plants really well. He could actually be decent at potions with practice but he’ll never love it.”

Nott rolled over and propped his head on a pillow, watching Harry. His eyes were shadowed. “That’s not what I meant.”

Harry looked back at him for a moment. He’d only met Nott a week ago. On the other hand, he was going to need allies he could trust to a certain degree—the snakes had taught him that. And the best way to create loyalty included making someone feel trusted even if they weren’t completely. “Insecure,” he said. “Nervous about being a Hufflepuff and a family that thought he was a Squib.”

“They thought _what?”_ Nott lifted his head off the pillow. “He—Longbottom’s annoying as hell but I saw him accidentally bounce down four flights of stairs when someone tripped him at a party.”

So they _had_ met each other before. “Did anyone _else_ see it?”

Nott frowned. “Just the other kids.”

“Who tripped him?”

“Roger Davies. Ravenclaw third year.”

“Family probably didn’t hear about it or didn’t believe it,” Harry said.

“Bizarre. Most families all but sic a Seer on their kids looking for the first signs of accidental magic. How you’d miss _bouncing down a set of stairs_ I have no idea.”

Harry shrugged and got out the Charms textbook. They had an essay due Monday.

“I see why you picked him,” Nott added a few minutes later.

Harry didn’t look up but he knew Nott saw his thin smile anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the delay. I had my last final on Monday, and then I've been traveling home, settling in, seeing my family again, etc. There are more bookshelves in my bedroom now and for the first time i can remember i actually have more shelf space than i need. it is glorious. 
> 
> also, for anyone who likes sci fi, hair-raising suspenseful plots, funny books, and side doses of great romance: Obsidio, the 3rd book in the Illuminae Files series, just came out. First one's named Illuminae. They are fantastic. the format of the books is unconventional and i took a few segments to get used to it in book 1 but it actually works brilliantly.


	6. wizard's duel

Life settled into a routine. Harry eavesdropped at meals without saying much, watching the power plays and banter and hoarding the nuggets of information he got about his classmates’ weaknesses and the magical world’s culture. He brewed with Longbottom twice a week, and it showed in class—Granger and Malfoy still beat him sometimes but Harry usually produced the best potions. Even if he could never get closer than a shade or two off from the textbook standard, which was annoying.

He spent his free time studying or practicing. The teachers all warned about “core strain,” when young magicals cast too much magic and tired themselves out easily, but Harry ignored them. All the extra practice with basic charms and transfiguration and jinxes left him starving but never exhausted. He ate more than at any other point in his life but he was at the top of nearly everything, the exception being History, where he was still just barely keeping up.

Nott or Longbottom usually joined him in the library one or two afternoons a week. Nott preferred the common room. Harry was pretty sure he just liked lurking in corners and making the other firsties nervous with that creepy sharklike stare he had. If Nott showed up and saw Longbottom with Harry, he’d turn around and leave. Longbottom, on the other hand, would sit down next to the other Slytherin without hesitation. Nott always found an excuse to leave within ten minutes of Longbottom showing up on those days.

Granger, Weasley, Macmillan, another Hufflepuff named Alice Bires, and a Ravenclaw named Lily Moon seemed to hate Harry on principle. Nott said that their families were all progressive or neutral politically. They probably thought Harry was some kind of traitor for going Slytherin. He hid his anger and kept studying. One day he’d be better than all of them and they would regret making fun of him at every chance.

 

Nott dropped a flyer on Harry’s book.

He blinked at it, then up at his—sort-of friend. “Flying lessons?”

“And because of _house unity_ , we have it with all four Houses.” Nott slid into his usual breakfast seat next to Harry. “Typical.”

“Do we have to go?” Davis muttered. “I hate heights.”

Nott looked disgusted. Harry privately agreed, even if he didn’t show it. Davis should really know better than to just announce her fears like that. Especially since Bulstrode was only two places down the table from Nott and had probably overheard. “It says here that after you pass the basic broom skills test, you can quit the lessons if you want, and most people pass that on the first day.”

“It’s mostly for the people who’ve never been on brooms,” Hopkins said dismissively. “We’ll be fine.”

“Oh good.”

Hopkins snorted into her oatmeal.

Harry was secretly a little worried. Even if he wasn’t as stupid as Davis, and never admitted it. Everyone else in his House had been on a broom at least once or twice before, and unlike History, he couldn’t read ahead or study. He’d glanced through _Quidditch Through the Ages_ and _Broomsticks for Beginners_ , and they both said you couldn’t really learn it out of a book.

Although—he looked at Granger— _some_ people were certainly trying.

Only Nott knew that Harry hadn’t been joking about the Muggle orphanage thing. He hadn’t even made hints around the other Slytherins and would occasionally jump in with an unasked-for bit of information when he caught Harry getting confused. So far none of his bits of help had been wrong. Now, he was keeping half an eye on Harry while they ate and walked down to the lawn, but he didn’t comment.

“We’ll be doing this in shifts, since the school only has twenty-five available brooms,” Madam Hooch barked, hands on her hips and glaring. “I don’t care what colors you’re wearing. First set to the brooms go first, the rest of you stay out of the way.”

Harry would much rather watch than join the crush of students trying to get on a broom. He hung back. Most of the Slytherins plowed right into the pack, along with all the Gryffindors except Granger and half each of the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws. Nott hung back too. A few of the Puffs glared at him and he leered back until they left him alone.

Longbottom caught Harry’s eye and grinned tentatively. Weird; he was a pureblood but he hadn’t gone running for a broom.

Harry nodded back with a faint smile. The Hufflepuff took this as encouragement and came over, dragging a blond-haired boy in his wake. “Hey, Potter, Nott,” he said.

“Longbottom.” Harry eyed the other boy. Chin up, shoulders square, dripping wealth and grouchiness. Definitely noble. “Well met. Heir Harry of House Potter.”

“Zacharias Smith, Heir of Smith,” the Hufflepuff drawled. So noble and of the same rank as Parkinson and Nott. Viscount. The books were maddeningly unhelpful on this subject but Harry knew it was higher than the Potter Lordship.

Nott nodded once. “Good to see you, Smith.”

“Wish I could say the same,” Smith said.

Weirdly, Nott grinned, and Smith cut a thin smile at that point. They were… not friends, exactly, but not enemies either, then.

“Not excited to fly?” Nott asked them.

Smith shrugged. “I’ve no love for it. Give me Floo any day.”

“I’ve never been on a broom,” Longbottom admitted. “Gran won’t let me near them.”

“She’s overprotective,” Smith stage whispered.

“That’s ridiculous,” Nott said pityingly. “Pick one with straight twigs, then, if you can. The school brooms are shite.” His eyes slid briefly to Harry.

“Surely they have funding for this sort of thing,” Smith said.

Nott snorted. “Are you suggesting our Headmaster pay attention to his school responsibilities instead of his political ones and actually run this place?”

“Ah, true, that was stupid of me,” Smith agreed.

Longbottom stared at them. “But… it’s Dumbledore!”

“He doesn’t cure dragon pox, Longbottom, don’t just blindly worship the man,” Nott said.

Smith jumped in and changed the subject to Professor Crouch’s painfully slow pace in class, giving Longbottom a chance to recover from what was apparently quite a crack in his worldview. Harry just shook his head and let Smith and Nott carry the conversation. Just because someone had authority didn’t mean they could be trusted with it. Better for Longbottom to realize that early and develop some critical thinking.

“So.” Smith looked at Harry. “Are you sick of it yet?”

“Sick of what?” Harry said. He was sick of a lot of things, the top one probably being human stupidity, but somehow he didn’t think that’s what Smith meant.

Smith gestured indifferently at the other students spread out on the lawn, either watching the first round of flying lessons or talking. “The staring.”

Harry almost smiled. Smith was testing whether Harry’s fame had gone to his head. He could get to tolerate this Hufflepuff. “Honestly, I was sick of it by the end of the welcome feast, but I doubt that’ll change for a while.”

“And you’ll be using it at some point,” Smith said.

Nott and Harry both looked at him, then.

“What? You’re Slytherins and I’m not stupid.”

Harry was beginning to think sitting with Longbottom on the train had been a real stroke of luck.

Hooch blasted her whistle. “Second group! You’re up!”

“I’m going to get this over with so I can go back inside,” Smith said.

“I’ll watch a bit more,” Harry said.

Smith squinted at him for a second. “Really? Potters are apparently all really good fliers.”

“Mmm.” Harry looked coldly back at him. Smith shrugged and let it drop.

Longbottom hesitated. “I’ll… wait. I’d rather not do this with—an audience.”

“See you in the common room, then,” Smith said without anger, and sauntered off to join the rest of the group.

Harry tuned everyone out and watched this time. Smith, for all he didn’t like flying, seemed very good at it. He handled the broom better than most of the other kids and landed before all of them as Hooch checked off his basic broom skills. The Hufflepuff nodded in Harry, Nott, and Longbottom’s direction before heading back up to the castle.

“He doesn’t seem very… Hufflepuff-y,” Nott said.

Longbottom shrugged. “Someone told him off for being grouchy and he said something about how he’d rather be honest and grouchy than fake and kind. Then he said, um. “Take your snooty fake-caring voice and piss off.””

“I could get to like him,” Nott said, snickering.

The rest of the lesson went off without a hitch for Harry. Flying was a lot easier than it looked—once he got on a broom, it was like he already instinctively knew what to do. It still took him a few tries to figure things out but he thought he could really come to love flying if he ever got a chance to practice.

The only bit of drama was when Malfoy picked a fight with Weasley and his goons. Weasley threw a punch like a Muggle and gave Malfoy a black eye, and got detention for his troubles. Harry sneered in their direction and stayed well out of it.

 

The Slytherin seventh year had been pacing for an hour.

Harry, hidden in the balcony, had yet to be noticed. It was colder up here and draftier than down by the fires along two walls of the lower level, but much more private. No one needed to know about his insomnia.

Harry had spent half his nights in the common room so far, dozing in and out of sleep in a very well-hidden balcony niche with his back against the wall. It set him on edge to sleep in a room with other people and _know_ he was so vulnerable. Nott didn’t worry him too much at this point but Goyle could do anything. Up here was better. Even if a lot of Slytherins seemed to have issues sleeping, and would pace or read or just sit in the common room at weird hours of the night, no one ever came up into the cold balcony.

Someone else stuck their head out of the dorms. “Higgs, what are you doing up? We’ve got a quiz in Charms tomorrow.”

“Still can’t contact her,” Higgs growled.

This was interesting.

The second person came all the way out of the dorms. A girl, maybe sixth or seventh year, wrapped in a thick dressing gown. “Puffs still being judgmental pricks?”

“Not them so much as her parents,” Higgs sighed quietly. Probably he thought he and his friend were alone, but still. Idiot. “We have to set meeting times and places but I can’t even get a message to her. The Davies girl is always around and she’d tell.”

“Pacing’s not going to help,” the girl said. “Go back to sleep already.”

For a second, the only sound was the soft crackling of the hearths.

“Yeah, okay, just… in a minute,” Higgs said.

The girl hugged Higgs and retreated to her dorm. Harry cocked his head. So this Higgs needed a way to get a message to a Hufflepuff.

He crept down the stairs from the balcony. Higgs had quit pacing and thrown himself over a sofa. Harry walked up behind him, considered the best approach, and slipped around the side of the sofa.

Higgs’ wand was trained on him in an instant, until he saw who it was and relaxed. “Potter—”

“Secret meetings with a Puff, huh?” Harry said, slumping back on an armchair. It always unnerved and pissed off the older orphanage boys when he used his I’m-better-than-you posture on them so he slipped it on now and smirked. “Juicy stuff.”

“Get to the point, Potter.”

“I can get your message to your Puff with no one knowing.”

Higgs blinked at him for a few seconds. “You’re Harry Potter. If you go knocking around asking where their common room is with a message for a certain person, everyone will know about it by dinner tomorrow.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “ _I_ won’t be handing her the message.”

“And what are you asking?” Higgs said.

“Favor now, favor later,” Harry said.

“Nothing big,” Higgs said.

Harry grinned. “I don’t know, it seems pretty important to _you…”_

“Small favor,” Higgs said firmly. “You don’t have to put much effort in.”

Harry considered this for a few seconds, and nodded.

“So mote,” Higgs sighed.

“So mote,” Harry repeated, smirking.

 

“Why does Higgs keep looking at you weird?” Nott said at breakfast.

“Favor now, favor later,” Harry said.

“You… did a favor for a seventh year?”

Harry looked at him. “Did I say that?”

Nott grumbled the rest of the way through breakfast.

 

“Longbottom, hold up.”

Longbottom paused in the hallway. “Potter—what is it? I thought I was seeing you Wednesday—”

“No, we are, but I need a small favor.” Harry pulled Higgs’ envelope out of his pocket. “Can you get this to Nymphadora Tonks? She’s a seventh year in your House.”

“Sure.” Longbottom stuff it into his own pocket.

Harry stared. “I was… going to offer a favor back.” That was how it worked. He’d seen over a dozen small exchanges go down around Slytherin just in the first five weeks of school.

“Eh.” Longbottom shrugged. “I mean… that’s not really how Hufflepuffs do it.”

All right then. “Oh, and don’t tell anyone it came from me, please?” Harry shifted like he was uncomfortable. “With my name… you know, people would be talking about it and…”

“Of course not.” Longbottom patted his shoulder and Harry forced himself to stay still under the touch.

 

Harry studied the Slytherins with a particular goal after that. The bargain with Higgs made him realize—there was almost definitely a raging smuggling business going on in this school. There were so many rules about what you could and couldn’t have on campus. It was an open secret in Slytherin that many of them had artifacts, pets, books, or other things that were either forbidden by the school or outright illegal. Snape turned a blind eye to most of what went on in Slytherin as long as they kept it in-house, including the practice duels that sprang up on the rare occasion words weren’t enough to settle arguments. The blind eye included their illegal objects. But surely there was someone known to get those things on and off school grounds…

In fact, with all the secret passages Harry had found, he was pretty sure it wouldn’t take long to come across one that led off campus. He’d already discovered one that went from the east tower, right under the hospital wing, out to the base of the castle’s northern face, even though there was nothing to the north except the Forbidden Forest and the Whomping Willow.

The weird thing was that he _couldn’t_ see a person in particular who smuggled things. The Weasley Demons, universally hated and admired by Slytherin, seemed to get around the castle without a hitch, and rumor had it they could get on and off the grounds if they had to. Nothing else explained the Gryffindor parties with wizarding sweets sold only in the town of Hogsmeade that Harry heard about from Longbottom. (No Slytherins were ever invited to Gryffindor parties.) But the twins didn’t seem to bring anything _else_ into or out of the castle. They were the most stereotypical Gryffindor anarchy to ever exist.

Some students definitely ran smuggling rings inside the castle, but most people could pass notes pretty easily, unless you were Higgs and watched very closely because you were Slytherin and a Seeker. It took a week to put the pieces together but Quidditch was apparently a very big deal, and Higgs was Seeker and Tonks was a Beater, and everyone was very suspicious of the Slytherins sabotaging other Quidditch teams.

Their fear was not entirely unfounded, going off some things Harry had overheard the Quidditch team saying.

Harry had no intention of smuggling objects. Maybe to start, but favors were so much more interesting.

 

The second step came halfway through October.

“Excuse me?”

Harry looked up. Ravenclaw, his year. Bole. Her brother Asten was a Slytherin Beater. “Yes?”

Bole half-bowed. “Portia of Bole.”

He’d heard that introduction once before, from a Hufflepuff to a Gryffindor. It was lower than his rank but not by much. “Heir Harry of House Potter. Well met.”

“Well met,” Bole repeated. She hovered slightly. Harry kept his expression pleasant and blank, one hand casually resting over his open book so she wouldn’t see he was studying wards they wouldn’t learn until Ancient Runes. The non-sleeping was becoming a problem and he had to figure out how to protect his bed.

“Have a seat,” he invited, when it got obvious she was waiting for some kind of sign.

Bole plunked down immediately. “I need help with Potions,” she said bluntly.

He loved Ravenclaws. They rarely bothered with small talk. “Really,” Harry said.

“Yes, really, and I noticed Longbottom quit blowing things up, and I followed him for a week before I figured out why.” Bole leaned across the table. “I want you to tutor me.”

“Why me? Why not Malfoy or Granger?” Much as Harry hated to admit it, both of them were capable in potions, and he only scored best in class about half the time.

Bole snorted. “Are you joking? Malfoy’s an impossible prat and Granger is the worst know-it-all I’ve ever met, and I’m in the house of know-it-alls.”

“Half of our teachers think she should’ve been a Ravenclaw,” Harry pointed out.

“Then they’re idiots. Ravenclaw values open minds. Potions. Tutoring. You’re a Slytherin so we can do the favor-trading thing.”

“Favor now, favor later,” Harry said.

Bole nodded. “Equal or lesser value.”

“So mote.”

“So mote,” she repeated, and stuck out her hand. Amused, Harry shook it.

He could ask her for lessons on wizarding manners—but he was learning, slowly, from watching and Nott’s quiet commentary. Asking for that would basically be telling her that he had no idea what was going on and her older brother was in Slytherin. Awful idea. Best to keep this favor in his pocket until he needed it.

“We meet on Saturdays after lunch and Wednesdays after dinner,” he said. “If you won’t risk missing curfew, come on Saturdays only.”

“Flitwick gives passes for those of us who want to study outside the Tower,” she said. “I’ll ask him for a pass for a study group, he won’t question it.”

“Are you afraid of being seen with a Slytherin?” Harry said.

“My brother is one. That’d be a _no_.”

“Okay. It’s Thursday, so meet me in the entrance hall after lunch on Saturday and I’ll show you where Longbottom and I usually work.”

 

Asten Bole cornered him that evening in the common room. “Saw you with my sister in the library,” he said.

“How observant.” Harry tilted his chin back a bit, held his shoulders loose and broad.

Bole studied him for a few seconds. “No one can get a read on you, Potter.”

“That sounds like not my problem.”

“Don’t drag my sister into Slytherin politics,” Bole said. “She knows what it’s like and she doesn’t want any part of it.”

Blackmail or goodwill, blackmail or goodwill… “I don’t plan to,” Harry said.

Bole nodded like Harry had just confirmed something.

 

Harry got a letter by owl post the next morning, his first of the year. “Look, Potter’s got mail,” Malfoy jeered. “Your guardians finally remember you existed, Potty?”

“He’s copying Peeves’ insults, I think,” Nott said to Davis.

“At least I don’t need sweets from Mummy every other day to keep me from wetting the bed,” Harry said sweetly. Malfoy flushed.

Greengrass tipped Harry an approving nod.

Harry was pretty sure Parkinson was using Malfoy to draw Bulstrode’s fire while Parkinson herself sat back and tallied weaknesses. Zabini was a mystery, Crabbe loyal to Malfoy, Goyle waffling between Malfoy and Bulstrode, and Vane followed Greengrass around like she was on a leash. Hopkins sat between Greengrass and Harry most days. She was friends with Davis, who still tended to tag along after Harry for protection, but she was also some kind of family ally to the Greengrasses, which meant she sat with Greengrass and Vane more often than not. Greengrass, Vane, and Hopkins had stayed out of the political sparring so far, like Harry and Nott, but they were all sizing each other up. Harry thought Greengrass might ally with Zabini at some point. That would definitely tilt the scales her way. For some reason, everyone seemed wary of Zabini.

Bulstrode made a sneering comment about Malfoy’s packages, Malfoy snapped back, and everyone was distracted. Harry slit the envelope open.

_Malfoy’s going to make a move soon, I suspect this weekend. Most likely a duel challenge. -AB_

Nott looked a question his way. Harry tilted the note so Nott could see.

“Why?” Nott murmured.

“His sister approached me for Potions tutoring. Last night he told me to leave her out of Slytherin politics.”

“And you didn’t try and blackmail him with it,” Nott finished. “Good call. He’s… protective. Both parents died in the war and they live with their grandfather, who’s bedridden and not all there in the head. He and his sister are really close.”

Harry weighed the small note in his hand. An implicit favor repaid, and a gesture of cautious goodwill at the same time.

Smiling faintly, he pushed a bit of magic into his hand and incinerated the note.

Silence fell. Harry looked up. All the first years were staring at him.

He raised an eyebrow.

“Did you just…” Vane trailed off.

“No,” Harry said, and went back to his breakfast.

Next to him, Nott laughed. Everyone flinched away from the sound.

 

Harry leaned across the library table. “Tell me about duels,” he said softly.

Nott looked up, a little surprised. It was the first time Harry had specifically asked for help on anything regarding wizard manners; most of the time Nott just offered up brief explanations without request. “Duels are a way to settle conflicts,” he said quietly. “Two first-years won’t be able to do much damage to each other. If Malfoy comes at you with a duel challenge, it’s because he wants to humiliate you.”

“He’ll pull the halfblood card,” Harry guessed.

“Probably. Especially if he wins,” Nott said. “That would be proof that he, the pureblood Heir of Malfoy, is magically superior to halfblood Harry Potter, savior of the Light.”

“No matter I’m beating him in every class,” Harry muttered. “Fine. How does it work?”

“You’ll have a second. Me, I’m betting, unless you’d rather Longbottom.” Nott smirked.

Harry rolled his eyes. “Funny.”

“The second’s a formality in most duels. People only die in the _really_ dramatic duels-to-the-death used to settle family feuds, and in some of those, the second might challenge the victory and jump in to finish off the winner, and then they’ll probably win because they’re fresh, at which point the original winner’s second will probably step in and settle it. Like I said, no one uses seconds. Just don’t be surprised when he brings that up.”

“What are the rules for delivering and accepting a challenge?”

Nott tapped his fingers on the table. “The challenge can be delivered however you want. _So mote_ to accept. The challenged sets the time and the challenger the location. Challenger proposes weapons used and the challenged has to agree. Seconds can try to renegotiate that before the duel but that doesn’t happen much, either. I think that’s it.”

“I don’t really know any magic that would be useful in a duel,” Harry said. “Knockback Jinx and the _protere_ shield but that’s it.”

Nott made a face. “Why d’you think Crouch moves so slow in lessons? He’s trying to cripple our Defense skills, especially Slytherins. Malfoy will definitely know more than that. The Trace doesn’t work in his family manor and the Malfoys have a really nasty library. Only the Blacks, Selwyns, and maybe the Burkes could top it.”

Harry shoved his history book aside. “I’d best start reading up, then.”

He wasn’t in as bad a situation as he pretended as Nott helped him look up spells. Harry wasn’t an idiot. Magic had been his advantage over the other kids in the orphanage, even if it was also the reason they hated him so much in the first place. Here, just _having_ magic wasn’t enough. He had to be the best at it. And he was no stranger to the violence kids could throw around, so he’d been looking into defensive spells since the first day.

The problem was that it was really hard to test them.

Nott dragged him off to an abandoned classroom and they started drilling spells. Harry steered them away from the ones he already knew, like the Dancing Hex, the Body-Bind, Jelly Legs, and the Stinging Hex, towards things like the Disarming Charm and _protego_ shield. Nott also knew some nastier low-level hexes like _langlock_ and _arresto luminus_ , which respectively glued your tongue to the roof of your mouth or stopped light from entering your eyes. Both of them would last until the magic ran out or someone cast the counter. “We don’t learn silent casting until sixth year,” Nott said. “If you can hit him with _langlock_ , all he’ll have left is Muggle-style.”

“And then I can mock him for fighting like a Muggle,” Harry said with a mean smile. Nott had quite a nasty streak of his own and Harry had begun slowly dropping his perfect-student or reserved-and-quiet masks around his closest ally.

 

Lunch on Saturday had the quiet that usually only happens before a storm. Even Bulstrode was subdued. Her clever dark eyes shifted between Harry and Malfoy for most of the meal, which was a neon warning sign.

“Nott,” he murmured.

Nott nodded slightly, confirming that he’d seen it, too.

They left together about ten minutes before the official end of lunch. Weekend meals were much more casual than during the weekday, with people coming in and out whenever it suited them, so there were a fair number of students flowing through the entrance hall when they left.

“Potter, Nott,” Bole said, pushing off the wall. She waved goodbye to two other Ravenclaws who started climbing the stairs toward their Tower.

“Bole,” he greeted.

Nott just waved sarcastically. 

“How was your Forgetfulness Potion yesterday?” Bole asked as they started walking. Nott tagged along, which Bole didn’t question.

“Two shades off. Like usual,” Harry muttered.

“It makes no sense,” Bole agreed. “I’ve seen how you brew. You should be getting what the textbook describes.”

Nott’s elbow landed in his ribs.

“Potter!”

“Here we go,” Harry muttered. “Bole, go on to the classroom, let Longbottom know I might be a bit late.”

“Slytherins,” she sighed. “I’m _so_ glad the Hat put me in Ravenclaw. See you.”

As she bolted up the stairs, Harry and Nott turned around. Malfoy led Parkinson and Crabbe their direction, glaring. “Off with your Ravenclaw girlfriend?” he jeered.

“Is that supposed to be an insult?” Harry asked.

Malfoy faltered. “She’s a _girl.”_

Parkinson stiffened just a bit. Oh, an opening, how perfect. “Last I checked, you’ve got one of those in your little pack, too,” Harry said. “Or were you insulting the fact that she’s a Ravenclaw? In which case, best not let her brother hear you.”

Parkinson had got herself under control and she’d never ditch Malfoy in the middle of a spat, but Malfoy was carefully not looking at her in a way that said he was very aware of the sudden tension. “I’m sick of you,” Malfoy spat. “You don’t belong in Slytherin and it’s time someone proved it. In the dueling hall. Wands only, if you can bring yourself to behave like a proper wizard.”

“Midnight,” Harry said. “Don’t get caught breaking curfew or Mummy might send you fewer sweets this week.”

“Who’s your second?” Malfoy snapped, turning redder.

“Nott,” Harry said. “Yours?”

“Crabbe.” Parkinson’s eyes narrowed further.

“So mote,” Harry said.

“So mote.”

With one final glare, Malfoy stalked away. Crabbe lumbered after him.

Parkinson lingered. “Potions tutoring, huh?”

“Want in?” Harry said with a shark smile.

“I’d rather not owe you, Potter.” For a second the prissy, girly persona dripped away and she looked as cold on the outside as Harry felt on the inside. Then it was back and she smiled brightly. “Best of luck. Draco’s been working out of his family library since he turned ten.”

 

 The dueling hall turned out to be a specific corridor in the dungeons. There was no dust and bright balls of witchlight instead of torches flared up when the first-year Slytherins walked in.

No one spoke. Greengrass, Vane, Hopkins, Davis, Goyle, Zabini, Bulstrode, and Parkinson lined up along the walls, eyes glittering in the witchlight. Harry and Nott walked fifteen or so feet down the hallway and turned around to face Malfoy and Crabbe.

“Any renegotiations of the terms?” Parkinson called, clearly not expecting any.

Crabbe shook his head.

“I have.” Nott stepped forward and bowed in Parkinson’s direction. “We never settled the spoils.”

Harry restricted his glare. They never discussed this. What was Nott playing at?

“All right.” Parkinson grinned like the cat that ate the canary and got away with it. “Terms, Malfoy?”

Malfoy scowled and whispered something to Crabbe.

“If Malfoy wins, Potter lets Malfoy beat him in potions for the rest of the year,” Crabbe said.

“Terms?” Parkinson turned on them.

Nott cocked his chin up. “If Potter wins, the blood status comments stop. From all your crew, Malfoy.”

Harry didn’t laugh, but only barely.

Tension sparked and grew. This was throwing down the gauntlet. Grades were one thing but blood status was the nuclear bomb of Slytherin insults. People just didn’t bring it up except as a last resort because there were so many deep-rooted conflicts surrounding that issue. Davis looked nervous, Greengrass intrigued, and Parkinson positively delighted. Zabini was amused but then again he almost always looked amused at everyone and everything.

“So mote,” Malfoy all but growled.

“So mote,” Harry agreed.

Parkinson twirled her hair around one finger. “Seconds, step aside.”

They retreated five steps behind the duelists.

“And… mark!”

Harry’s wand was up and moving by the time Parkinson’s last syllable left her mouth. Malfoy, the arrogant prat, went on the offensive immediately. _“Protere,”_ Harry said. His shield absorbed the Dancing Curse and died.

 _“Locomotor wibbly,”_ Malfoy hissed. Harry dodged. Really? The Malfoy Library at his fingertips and he came up with the _Jelly-Legs Jinx?_

 _“Langlock,”_ Harry said, dodging.

Malfoy shielded.

 _“Volculeus, protere, langlock,_ ” Harry said. A Trip Jinx caught him and his Stinging Hex went wide, but the shield took a spell he didn’t hear and then the _langlock_ found its mark just as Harry caught himself on a wall.

Malfoy’s mouth gaped open.

Harry grinned. “ _Expelliarmus.”_

The hall fell silent. Malfoy’s wand clattered to the ground.

Harry shot off a last Trip Jinx and Malfoy hit the ground hard. He heard several stifled gasps but Harry made a habit of never leaving an enemy half-defeated.

“Oh, look at that,” Harry said, calling Malfoy’s wand to his hand with a little force of will. It was harder than magic with his wand but he hadn’t learned a spell to summon things yet, and the combination of awe, fear, and shock on the others’ faces was priceless. “A halfblood beat you. Maybe… how did you put it? Oh yeah—maybe it’s _you_ who’s not a proper wizard.”

“Victor, Potter,” Parkinson said. For the second time the girly mask broke.

Malfoy got to his feet, face bright red. Jerkily, he bowed. “Victor, Potter,” he spat. “So mote.”

“So you do know when to quit.” Harry twirled Malfoy’s wand in his fingers and offered it, handle first. He wasn’t up on all the wand etiquette yet but a petty duel in Slytherin at the end of September had ended in a wand being handed back tip-first, and the recipient had put the one who did it in the hospital wing a week later.

Slowly, Malfoy took his wand.

Harry looked around. The rest of the Slytherins were looking back and forth between him and Malfoy, clearly rethinking some things.

He spun the aspen and walnut wand around his left hand the same way he just had Malfoy’s. It soothed him to have the wand there, ready to use, just as much as it threatened everyone else. “Next time someone has a problem with me, settle it with words. We’re not Gryffindors,” he said with a sneer.

Nott smiled a slightly insane smile and loped out of the hall after Harry. Davis scrambled to follow them. She was pathetic but she might, at some point, be useful—minions always were.

Interestingly, Parkinson came back into the common room with Greengrass instead of Malfoy and Crabbe. Harry and Nott were already sitting in their usual pair of chairs near the window. No one had paid much attention when they came in—the first-years and their power struggles went mostly ignored by everyone else—but Malfoy coming back with only Crabbe at his shoulder drew some stares.

“They’ll all know by morning,” Nott said with a thin smile.

“Pity they didn’t all have your foresight,” Harry agreed.

Nott leaned back and kicked his feet up on the table. “I’m just brilliant like that. Parkinson might flip.”

“She wouldn’t share top spot,” Harry said. “And I don’t settle for second best.”

“She might,” Nott said. “Settle, that is. She’s pragmatic enough to take the left hand of the King instead of tie herself to a broken broom, which is what Malfoy’s become. For now.”

“And the right hand of the King… that’d be you?” Harry said.

“Duh.”

“You do know I’m ambidextrous, right?”

Nott sighed theatrically. “I can live with that.”

Harry smiled slowly. Nott twitched a little. This was the cruelest of Harry’s smiles, the one that had last made an appearance when that stupid Muggle girl ended up in a coma. “Then we should probably be on a first-name basis.”

“Theo, then. I hate Theodore,” Nott said.

“Harry.”

“First bit of advice, then. Officially.” Nott—Theo—leaned forward a little. “You need new glasses, and you need to tame that hair.”

“It doesn’t tame,” Harry said. “I’ve tried.”

“You are such a Mudblood sometimes,” Theo muttered. “Use bloody magic.”

Right. Dammit, he kept forgetting. “Mudblood?”

“Oh. Crap. Uh…” Theo ran a hand through his hair. “It’s a… rude word usually aimed at Muggleborns. A really bad one. Like, if a crystal went around of the Minister saying it, they’d be sacked within a few days. Especially with politics how they are now.”

“But it can’t just be for Muggleborns, because I’m not,” Harry said.

“Right. Malfoy would use it like that ‘cause he’s not the brightest,” Nott said. “It’s more meant for people who don’t bother learning about our world. Mostly Muggleborns but some halfbloods. Granger’s a Mudblood but that Gryffindor Thomas is decent, he listens in class and doesn’t try to shove Muggle bullshit down our throats, so no one’s ever called _him_ that except, again, maybe Malfoy. Bulstrode would if she bothered to notice him.”

“And you called me that.”

“You deserved it. You’re a _wizard_. Get used to it.”

“I regret this arrangement,” Harry said.

Nott snickered. “We both know you won’t back out.”

And he wouldn’t, because Nott was clever. His family was poor and in disgrace for some reason, to the point even Malfoy, who wasn’t exactly in the people in power’s good graces, picked at him all the time. He was now associated with Harry Potter. And Harry couldn’t dump him because now Nott knew several of Harry’s secrets, things he couldn’t have spread around.

Nott had at least underestimated him. There were spells to silence people and bind their secrets, Dark spells mentioned only as things forbidden in the books Harry had found, but he would learn them in case Nott ever became a liability.

Still. It was… nice… having someone clever around. Neither of them pretended to be anything other than mean, self-interested little bastards, and that at least was a relief.

 

There was no huge fallout from the duel, but some things subtly changed. Malfoy’s family was politically weak but Harry got the sense that so were most of the Slytherin families, and the Malfoy name was an old and wealthy one. People assumed they would bounce back from the hit they took after the war with the father being in prison. Which meant most people had assumed Malfoy would still be a leader in his year. Which in turn meant that Harry Potter, the quiet halfblood, having kicked his ass in a duel—that drew attention.

Greengrass stepped into the power vacuum. Harry was pretty sure that her family wasn’t quite as influential as the Malfoys but he heard something about them declaring Neutral in the Wizengamot. Malfoy was down but not out. Bulstrode and Greengrass circled like sharks and Parkinson had gone back to her watch-and-wait strategy, this time from Greengrass' shoulder.

Meanwhile, the older students kept a slightly more interested eye on them.

 

“I wasn’t kidding about the glasses. It’s November. You’ve had plenty of time to think it over and send your prescription out.”

Harry glared halfheartedly at Nott—Theo. That was still a bit weird even two weeks since they’d officially extended an offer of first names. “I know.”

“So why haven’t you owl ordered a new pair?” Theo hissed. “For Merlin’s sake, you look like a bloody Mudblood. The hair needs some work but it’s better. The secondhand robes you’ve already shut the others down on. But the glasses! They’re smudgy, too small—”

“I used an _engorgio_ on them but it messed up the lenses.”

“Exactly! Order a new pair!”

Harry very, very carefully kept his anger in check. “I cannot.”

Theo rubbed his forehead. “Okay. _Why?_ I know you have an owl and she’s just sitting up there in the tower.”

“I have no one to write to,” Harry said, and held up a hand.

Theo ignored it. “An optometrist—”

 _“Langlock,”_ Harry spat.

He hadn’t used his wand but Theo’s eyes bulged as his tongue stuck and stopped working.

“ _But_ ,” Harry said, walking like nothing was wrong so Theo had to stick with him, “I can’t buy more glasses because I can’t afford it.” He flicked his wand and ended the spell.

Theo swallowed and rubbed at his throat. “You… what? But—the Potters were wealthy. More so than a lot of higher-ranked nobles, your grandfather invented this hair potion—actually that might work better than the charms for you, look up Sleakeazy sometime—but the point is surely you have a trust vault?”

Harry pinched the bridge of his nose. “Theo. When you went shopping in Diagon, how much did you have to buy?”

“Um… half the books. Stock up my potions kit. Got a new quill but I do that once a month anyway. My wand, obviously. And the uniforms.”

“I had to buy everything on that list,” Harry said. “Muggle-raised, remember? My withdrawal limit barely covered it as is. I haven’t got the forty galleons left for glasses. Not to mention I don’t even know my prescription. The last time I had it checked, I was seven.”

Theo shook his head. “That makes no sense. Look, I know you’ve caught on, but—my family’s vaults are really low. A hell of a lot lower than what they used to be. We’re a bit pinched but Father could still spare the hundred and fifty galleons for my new stuff.”

If Harry had been stupider, he might have said something about this not being fair. Theo talked about a hundred and fifty galleons like it was pocket change. And he’d gotten half of the new purchases that Harry had. “My withdrawal limit is two hundred galleons.”

Theo stopped walking.

Harry kept on another three paces and turned back, annoyed. “We are going to be late to the potions session if you don’t hurry up,” he snapped.

“Two hundred…”

“Yes, I get it, your family’s got galleons to spare even in your current situation, can we move on?”

“No.” Theo shook his head. “No, don’t curse me, listen—a hundred fifty to two hundred is what most families give for the year’s pocket money. The parents pay for school supplies with the family vault.”

Harry stopped. Blinked. “The goblins told me it was normal.”

“They might not have realized you had to buy all new stuff,” Theo said. “Or that you didn’t have an alternate source of—who’s your trustee?”

“Merlin,” Harry deadpanned.

“Fine, don’t tell me, but go to Gringotts over the holidays,” Theo advised. “Two hundred is ridiculous. Circe, this explains so much.”

It was the first time Theo had come to the potions practice sessions, and Harry wasn’t even paying enough attention to keep an eye on him. He answered Longbottom and Bole’s questions and rebrewed the Hair-Raising Potion from the day before—getting half a shade closer to the book standard even though he _did everything perfectly_ —but his mind was elsewhere.

Dumbledore.

“Longbottom.” He interrupted something Longbottom was saying about plants and didn’t care. “Who’re the Muggleborns in your hear in Hufflepuff?”

“Ah… Justin Finch-Fletchley, Leanne Torry, Roger Malone. Why?”

“How does the school handle Muggleborns? Introducing them to magic and such.” There were Muggleborns in Slytherin, a few of them even highly placed in the social ladder, but none of them talked about it.

Longbottom frowned. Harry reached over and stopped him adding pickled newt’s eyes instead of stewed fire salamander tongues. “They send a school representative to explain to their guardians, and take them to Diagon Alley. There’s a whole informational packet about writing with quills and stuff, and the money system, and how the school works, legal rights, the new laws they should know about, things like that.”

“What teachers?” Harry said.

Bole paused her brewing. “Why do you care?”

Theo shushed her, eyes on Harry.

“McGonagall, Sprout, Vance, and Quirrell handled it this year. I think.”

No Slytherins, but that wasn’t surprising. The surprising thing was that, of all people, Harry had gotten _Hagrid_. Who was a perfectly nice man with his heart in the right place but not exactly qualified to teach new students about the magical world. He’d been kicked out in his third year, didn’t have his wand rights, and spent all his time at Hogwarts.

“You realized something,” Theo said quietly that evening, when they were walking back down to their dorms.

Harry shrugged.

“Who took you to Diagon?”

“Hagrid.”

Theo took a few seconds to process this. “Sweet Circe.”

“Yep.”

 

Quidditch was bizarre.

 “Theo,” Harry said, watching a Bludger slam into someone’s head hard enough to concuss, “how fast does, say, a broken bone heal?”

“Uh…” Theo frowned, not looking away from the game. “No, you idiot, that’s a Rainwing Formation—on its own, or…”

“With medical attention,” Harry said witheringly.

“Right. Er, a few days? Depends on the type of break, I think. I snapped my thigh when I was seven, the kind where the bone sticks out of your leg, and the Healers had to magic it back into place and then heal the fracture. It took like… two days in St. Mungo’s? I was fine a week later. Sometimes if you really mess up a bone they just vanish it and regrow it. That’s shorter but really painful and tires out the body, so they save that for really bad breaks.”

Harry looked away from the game. “A _week?”_

“Yeah, why?”

He looked back. “No wonder wizards are less cautious about injuries,” he muttered. “For a Muggle that’d be a few months at least.”

Theo snorted. “I’m so glad I’m not a Muggle, imagine.”

“Don’t have to.”  

“…right.”

A few seconds later, Harry frowned. “What is the Gryffindor Seeker _doing?”_

“…Seeker Cormac McLaggen appears to be yelling at the Keeper, Oliver Wood, for letting a goal in—not really sure why ‘cause Wood’s saved over ninety percent of the shots if my mental math is right, which it usually is ‘cause I’m a genius—sorry, Professor— _Slytherin scores!_ ”

“McLaggen is an idiot,” Theo said. “But Gryffindor doesn’t have a good Seeker this year.”

They both looked at Higgs, cautiously circling high above.

“Then again, neither do we,” Theo added.

Oliver Wood called a time-out, appeared to yell at McLaggen for a few minutes, and directed everyone back into the air.

McLaggen beat Higgs by a few inches, erasing Gryffindor’s sixty-point lag. Slytherin lost.

“Damn,” Theo muttered.

 

“Oi.”

Harry glanced up, and did a double take. “Yes?”

The older girl half-bowed. “Deirdre Rookwood, Heir of Burke, Heir of House Rookwood,” she said.

“Heir Harry of House Potter,” he replied, standing to deliver the same half-bow. Technically it wasn’t required since she approached him, but she was older and he’d been watching long enough to have picked her out as some kind of feared outcast among the kids her age. Never hurt to be polite.

“Higgs said you can be discreet.”

This began to make a little more sense. “Did he.”

Rookwood sat gracefully across from him, her dark purple casual robes falling neatly. Harry wished he had casual robes but school uniforms or ugly Muggle clothes were his only options and he wouldn’t be caught dead in the latter, so he wore his uniform even on the weekends. “Yeah, he did.”

“I appreciate the compliment,” Harry said.

“Mmm.” Rookwood eyed him. “I’m in the unfortunate position of being watched by most members of the faculty wherever I go.”

“You’re not the only one,” Harry pointed out.

She smirked. “Yes, but they’re not watching you expecting you to go on a Dark magic-fueled murder spree.”

“Point.”

“I need something belonging to a certain Ravenclaw that I can’t get on my own.”

Harry glanced around the common room. It was right after lunch on a Sunday and most of the students were not here, but enough that eavesdropping was a risk. “Should we be having this conversation here?”

“I put up anti-listening spells, it’s fine.”

“In that case, what do you need, and from who?” Harry needed to learn those spells. As soon as he figured out some wards for his bed and trunk. Goyle had been poking through it lately and Harry didn’t have anything in there that was valuable or at risk—he hid his Muggle clothes inside a hole cut in his mattress—but still. It turned his vision red to think of someone going through _his_ things.

“Hair, from Roger Davies.”

“Why?” Harry said.

Rookwood raised an eyebrow. “Is that relevant?”

“Yes.” He hooked one knee over the other. “If it’s to glue in your diary with little hearts drawn around it, I can call in a favor. If it’s for something nastier, I’ll have to do it on my own so no one knows about my involvement, and that takes more work.”

“It’s not for a diary,” Rookwood said with a smirk. “Let’s just say… Davies has made some unpleasant advances toward a friend of mine.”

Harry nodded slowly. The Sisters had tried to shield their kids from most of the bad parts of the world, but enough of them came from bad childhoods that he knew things most eleven-year-olds probably shouldn’t. Enough to understand what Rookwood was getting at. It was a fair reason to want some kind of payback.

If this was anything like Muggle fairy tales, she could do some nasty things with Davies’ hair.

“Is there a time constraint?” he said.

“Before Imbolc, preferably.”

He’d ask Theo about that later. Or Longbottom. “How much hair?”

“Just a strand would work. I’d prefer a few.”

“Favor now, favor later?” he said.

She nodded.

“So mote,” Harry said.

Rookwood stood up. “So mote.”

Theo took her place within two minutes. “What was _that_ about?”

“Favor now, favor later,” Harry said softly.

“You made a bargain with _Rookwood._ ” Theo shook his head. “Do you even know who she is?”

“Heir to a House at your rank and another at mine.”

“Yeah.” Theo laughed a little. “Yeah, but what those Houses _are_ —Augustus Rookwood worked in the Department of Mysteries. Top-secret, dangerous stuff, and he sold secrets to Voldemort. He was one of the highest-placed spies. Viscount Burke was one of Voldemort’s closest lieutenants, he got off Azkaban by claiming Imperius but everyone knows it’s not true. He’s on house arrest but he fostered his friend’s daughter after Rookwood’s sentencing, and named her his Heir since he never had kids.”

No wonder she was an outcast.

 

Finding the Ravenclaw common room turned out to be easy. Harry looked up a silencing charm, put it on his shoes, and followed Bole one Wednesday after potions practice. He hid around the corner and heard her answer a riddle.

After the door closed, Harry crept out and looked closer. It was a heavy black wooden door bound in bronze, with an eagle-shaped door knocker. He wondered if other students could get in by answering the riddle. If not, he’d have to talk his way in with an older kid.

 

A quick word with Longbottom, and he learned that Imbolc was a wizarding holiday on February first, marking the return of spring. Mostly rural magicals still celebrated it and did old rituals for good fortune in the following year. Longbottom stutteringly admitted that the rituals were technically illegal but it was widely known that the Ministry ran itself ragged every year trying to hunt people down. Rural magicals, apparently, didn’t like being told that they couldn’t do the magic their families had been passing down for generations.

With that in mind, Harry put off plans to figure out how to disguise himself until the holidays. He was busy playing catch-up in History, keeping Longbottom from blowing up his cauldron and Bole from failing Potions, and trying to work out why he could _never_ match the textbook potion shading. Malfoy and Granger were improving and beating him more often than not lately. Harry had hit a plateau and couldn’t figure out why. It was infuriating.

There was also his side projects on warding and dueling magic. Common room squabbles didn’t dissolve into magic all the time, but often enough he needed to be ready. First and second years stayed mostly out of the House-wide political battles but they still fought among themselves and third years and up were open season. He needed to be ready now. Malfoy’s wasn’t the last magical challenge Harry would get even if it bought him some time to prepare.

 

“Do they read our mail?” he asked Theo in early December.

“Supposedly no.”

Harry sighed. “So, probably.”

“I mean, they could. Dumbledore’s no slouch with a wand. And you’re not exactly low profile.”

Poor Aoife; she never had anything to do. He’d just have to go to Gringotts in person and hope they weren’t mad he never made an appointment.

“Where do you go at night?” Theo said.

Harry jerked a little and looked up from his History essay. “What?”

“You’re not in your bed about half the time. I usually wake up a few times a night,” Theo said.

“Insomnia.” It was kind of true. Harry didn’t get nightmares, and he could fall asleep just fine as long as he felt safe. The problem was that he _didn’t_. Not in their dorm with one person he sort of trusted and one he absolutely didn’t.

Theo nodded.

The only upside of the insomnia was that Harry probably knew Hogwarts better than any of his fellow first years. Escaping the professors’ watchful eyes was as easy as dodging his spell-happy fellow students now. Only the portraits saw where he went and they never told unless students were doing something dangerous.

All he ever did was walk, and explore.

 

 “You’re sure you won’t be going home?” Longbottom said anxiously. “I mean… it’s Christmas.”

Theo snorted. “You mean Yule.”

“I… thought no one celebrated Yule,” Longbottom said.

Even Bole looked up at that. “Longbottom, how oblivious can you get?”

“Um…”

“Traditionalists, half the Neutrals, and most of the people of this country still celebrate Yule even if the Ministry tries to force these stupid Muggle holidays down our throats,” Theo snarled. “Christmas. Pah. Like I want to copy a religion that’s killed hundreds of thousands of magicals _and_ their own Muggles in the process because they’re too stupid to tell the difference.”

Longbottom looked about as startled as Harry felt. He’d never heard Theo sound that passionate about anything. But in front of Bole, he’d never ask.

“I—what’s Yule about, then?” Longbottom said.

Theo’s anger calmed a little, but he still looked pissed as he answered. “It’s on the winter solstice and it means—family. Coming together. Gift-giving, not big expensive things but little personalized gifts, like—that show you know the person. I hear Christmas is kind of similar, but still. There’s _supposed_ to be twelve days of gatherings and dinners and parties, but Hogwarts doesn’t let us out enough in advance, so most people with students here skip that and just do the one day on the twenty-first.”

“Oh.” Longbottom swallowed. “I thought it—thought it was something else.”

“What,” Bole muttered, packing up her cauldron, “worshipping darkness and evil?”

Longbottom looked away.

“Dear Merlin, you did,” the Ravenclaw said, stopping to stare at him. “What are they _teaching_ you lot—actually, never mind. I don’t want to know. I’ve already got a headache thinking about it. See you lot after the holidays. Happy _Yule_ , Longbottom.”

She stomped out, muttering under her breath.

“I think you might’ve annoyed her,” Harry said.

Longbottom huffed a laugh. “You think?”

“Why am I stuck babysitting two nobles with no cursed clue about our history,” Theo snarled.

“Because you had foresight,” Harry said with a smirk.

“What?” Longbottom asked.

Theo laughed a little. “Point. Don’t worry about it, Longbottom, Slytherin thing. Happy Yule.”

“Happy Yule,” Longbottom said, wincing a little.

Five minutes later, Theo and Harry were walking back to the dungeons. “I’m sending him a book on our customs and I’m doing it on Christmas disguised as something horrifically boring,” Theo announced.

 

On December nineteenth, the Slytherin dorms were a flurry of activity. Harry leaned on the balcony railing and watched from above as students ran back and forth, hauling trunks and birdcages and books, throwing clothes back to one another and generally rushing to make the train on time.

 _“Can I stop hiding for this week, then?”_ Raza said snidely from somewhere behind him.

Harry checked that no one was near them. The entire balcony was empty when he did a lap an hour ago but it never hurt to be sure. _“I only know of a few others who are staying, and none of my year, so you should be fine.”_

_“Thank venom. I am so sick of not getting to go places with you. It is boring on my own.”_

_“Once I figure out expansion charms you can come places in my pocket.”_

_“Then figure those out. Quickly.”_

_“So bossy.”_

_“If I wasn’t you’d never get anything done, hatchling.”_

Harry caught sight of someone on the stairs. _“Hide,”_ he warned. _“There’s someone coming and it looks like… yep, it’s Theo.”_

Grumbling, Raza retreated.

“Who were you talking to?” Theo said.

“Mordred,” Harry said.

Theo rolled his eyes. “You know, if anyone else told me they had a line to a dead evil wizard who tried to kill the last magical king of England, I would laugh, but I wouldn’t put it past you.”

Harry smirked.

Theo leaned on the railing and watched with him for a few minutes. “Going to be lonely,” he said at last.

“Am I supposed to care?”

“It’s not… it would be normal for you to care,” Theo said, carefully not looking at him.

Harry sighed. “I’m far from normal, Theo. You know that.”

“Still.”

Was he… oh Merlin, he was. Harry squeezed his eyes shut for a few seconds. What the hell Viscount Nott had done Harry still couldn’t figure out. Supported the Death Eaters somehow was his best guess but then why wasn’t the man in prison? Lucius Malfoy was and his son was doing all right. Theo, on the other hand, had grown up ostracized and friendless. And he was a creepy little shit with a mean streak a mile wide and more than a little mental instability, but he still had that stupid human need for companionship.

Harry could lie. Say something about how he’d miss Theo, fake a few emotions, bind them closer. But—he guessed he liked Theo as much as he’d ever liked anyone, and he didn’t want to outright lie.

“I… like having you around,” Harry said. “I won’t lie and say I’ll miss you, but I will look forward to you coming back.”

On the railing, Theo’s knuckles turned white. “That’s all I’m getting, isn’t it.”

“It’s the best I can offer,” Harry said quietly. “More than I’ve ever given anyone else.”

Theo’s lips twitched up into a mockery of a smile. “The coldest shark Slytherin’s ever seen, and his crazy friend. They won’t even know what hit them.”

Harry half-smiled. “Happy Yule, Theo.”

“Happy Yule.” Theo left without a backward glance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> apologies for being MIA the last week(ish?). I've been writing but only in bits, and i haven't been online much at all. I have a great excuse. I've been on vacation the last 3 days with some friends in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter Orlando!!!!! and oh my effing God it is incredible. I teared up when I walked into Diagon for the first time, and then again that day when we went to Hogsmeade and turned the corner and saw the castle. SO INCREDIBLE. 
> 
> anyway that's why i've been out of commission, hopefully back to a more normal schedule soon <3
> 
> additionally: i have discovered this fanfic called the Hogwarts School of Prayer and Miracles. Some Christian housewife rewrote the first book to get the "evil witchcraft" out of it and i got a fucking ulcer reading it but i also could not stop it's just... so ridiculous? i kept thinking it was a crack fic but i'm 98% sure at this point it's for real. which is even more ridiculous. here is the link, please go check it out at least it is so funny: 
> 
> https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10644439/1/Hogwarts-School-of-Prayer-and-Miracles


	7. Chapter 7

Severus dropped his forehead into one hand. He had a pile of essays to drown in scathing red ink and some Ogden’s finest to dull the headache that would undoubtedly result from helping Slughorn grade the first years’ latest round of idiocy. He had only agreed to this because the man could provide him some truly uncommon potions ingredients in exchange. The sooner he got through the essays the sooner he could get back to his research, and one of his snakes picked _today_ of all days to come knocking. The first day of the holidays.

Whoever was out there had better have a good reason or he was going to tear their self-esteem to shreds.

“Enter,” he snarled.

The door creaked open. Snape refused to show his surprise, but— _Potter?_

So far, he had yet to actually speak with the boy. Lily’s eyes but not, James Potter’s hair but somewhat tamed, the combination of his nemesis and his childhood love mixed with something very different and very Slytherin—it was not easy for Severus to deal with. Also, he could not get a read on the brat. Potter was quiet, respectful, intelligent, and apolitical. The Malfoy duel had given him a political opening that he for some reason hadn’t taken, yet the young Nott was sticking to his side like a frightfully loyal attack dog, and even Bulstrode had backed off him of late. Then there were the reports that Deirdre Rookwood had spoken to the boy, Asten Bole had called a truce with him, and against all odds he’d turned Longbottom into a passable Potions student. Not to mention the Potions essay of Potter’s that Severus had graded an hour ago was rather brilliant, much as he hated to admit it.

His intelligence could not be denied, nor his reserved character. But Severus had seen plenty of Slytherins come and go and he was fairly certain by now that the perfect respect that won even Bartemius’ grudging approval was fake. There was something hiding under Potter’s mask and the fact that he couldn’t tell what it was made him wary.

Even now, the boy closed the door behind him, gave a perfect half bow, and waited patiently. His face was polite and impassive, his hair neater than his father’s ever was, hands held loosely at his sides. His shoulders were set and his chin high, but every line of his posture screamed ease and deference, not arrogance.

“Sit,” Severus growled. Potter was _too_ put together. Anyone that streamlined was hiding things.

The boy did as told, sliding promptly and gracefully into the seat across from him. Severus had very purposefully chosen the least comfortable chair in the school to put across from his desk but Potter gave no indication it was any less pleasant than his own bed. “Good morning, sir.”

“What is it?” Severus folded his hands on the desktop.

“Sir, I would like to request permission to visit Gringotts.” Perfect modulation. Perfect tone.

Severus decided to shake him up a bit. “What,” he sneered at his most hateful, “run through all your pocket money?”

The boy blinked. “No, sir, or I would write and make a withdrawal. I need to speak with my accounts manager.”

“Whatever for?”

“I’ve never gotten a statement, or had my financial resources and responsibilities explained. When I visited last summer I was told that’s really weird, and I should visit over the holidays.”

Severus couldn’t stop himself blinking. It was the only indication of his shock that showed, but something told him the brat caught it.

He couldn’t bring himself to care. “Have your guardians withheld your account statements?”

“I… am not sure why I haven’t gotten them, sir.”

There was a non-answer if ever Severus had heard one. “Who are your guardians?”

“I’d rather not say.”

Everything about this felt off. Severus narrowed his eyes and went for a different tack. “I must inform the headmaster.”

Something almost like panic flashed across Potter’s face. “I thought the Head of House duties included confidentiality, if a student wants it. Also, you’re my de facto guardian while I’m in school. You can grant me permission to leave so I can see to my responsibilities as the last remaining Potter. I have reason, and it’s been done before.”

“Your case is… regrettably a bit different,” Severus said. He could feel the magic of his oaths to Slytherin and Hogwarts settling around him, though. The confidentiality clause kicking in. He wouldn’t be able to tell Albus a thing about this meeting, which was fine, because he hadn’t actually wanted to tell the meddling old coot anything. He’d just wanted Potter’s reaction.

Panic, at the thought of the headmaster. How very, very interesting.

“Gringotts has a Floo,” Potter said. “And it’s probably the safest place in magical Britain aside from Hogwarts itself.”

“I’ll still be accompanying you.” Severus made a snap decision and rose. “You are the Boy Who Lived and you will draw too much attention. I cannot in good conscience allow an eleven-year-old with a target on his back to waltz off to Diagon Alley on his own.”

The boy’s jaw tightened. “Sir—”

“If not me, then it must be your guardians,” Severus said, watching him closely. He had not missed the fact that the boy had only received one letter all term and it had come from the Bole family owl. “Would you give me permission to pull your files and contact them?”

Again the spark of panic. “No, sir. Thank you.”

He had sense. Good. “Very well. I presume you have Floo traveled before.”

“Yes, sir.”

Severus flicked his wand and summoned his pot of powder. “Here you are.”

“Now?”

He smirked at the surprise Potter couldn’t quite hide. “Unless you had a reason to wait?”

“No, sir. Thank you,” Potter said again, taking a pinch of the powder. A bit too much, actually. A common mistake Severus had made himself for many years before someone corrected him, as he’d never used Floo powder before coming to Hogwarts and no one ever told him that very little was necessary. Another oddity. The last Potter seemed surrounded by those.

Severus stepped into his fireplace and laid a hand on the inside. “Harry Potter has the permission of Severus Snape, Head of Slytherin House, to use this Floo,” he said clearly. The stones flared gold for a second as the Floo wards accepted the new access.

“That access will be revoked upon our return, so don’t get any ideas,” Severus warned, taking a pinch of powder on his own. He put the pot back and tossed it down. “Gringotts!”

 

* * *

 

Gringotts was almost exactly how Harry remembered. The only difference was that it was busier, probably the pre-holiday shopping rush.

Snape stalked along at his side, robes billowing. Harry honestly had not expected the professor to insist on coming but he’d backed Harry into a corner. He needed to get to Gringotts and he needed to keep his Muggle childhood a secret and he needed Dumbledore to not know about this trip if possible. The librarian had offered him the book that detailed the Head of House duties and responsibilities, which was where he found the confidentiality clause, so at least that base was covered.

He didn’t see Griphook so Harry walked up to the nearest teller. “Good day, Master Teller,” he said, dipping his head.

The goblin peered at him. “Good day. To whom am I speaking.”

Snape twitched a little, for some reason. “Harry Potter, sir. I am here to speak with my accounts manager if he is available.”

“Key, please.”

Harry fished it out of his pocket and handed it over.

The goblin studied it for a few seconds. “This appears to be in order. This way, Heir Potter. Your… companion may wait.”

“Sorry, Professor, I’ll try not to take too long,” Harry said, arranging his face into a perfect wide-eyed apology.

Snape waved it off. “Do what you must. I need to visit the apothecary anyway.”

Thank Merlin he hadn’t insisted on sitting in the meeting, too.

Harry followed the goblin back into the halls of Gringotts. The administrative areas looked more like the lobby than the vault tunnels—marble and gold instead of rough-hewn rock. All the doors were built to accommodate things much larger than wizards. Armed goblin guards were stationed here and there, all of them glaring at Harry as he walked by.

“Here you are. Griphook will be with you shortly,” the teller sneered, gesturing lazily toward a set of doors.

“Thank you, Master Teller.” Harry half-bowed.

“Yes.” The goblin eyed him for a minute before he took his leave.

Harry stepped cautiously into the office. It was sparse, elegant, and screaming wealth. The desk was goblin-sized and so were two of the visitors’ chairs. The other three were human-sized. Harry decided he’d rather look ridiculous in a chair too big for him than sit in one of the smaller ones and maybe break an etiquette rule, so he hopped up into one of the adult chairs and waited.

Griphook arrived about five minutes later. “Heir Potter. I thought I might be seeing you soon.”

“Master Griphook. Good day,” Harry said.

The goblin propped his spear on the wall and sat down across from Harry in his desk. “I presume you’re here to speak to me about your vaults?”

“Vaults, plural?”

“Two, to be precise.” Griphook snapped his fingers and a heavy book appeared on the table. “This would be all your vault statements, withdrawal records, deposit records, and the information and contracts associated with each vault, dating back to the moment each came into your possession. That would be the moment of your birth for vault three one five, which you visited on thirty-first July of this year, and first November, nineteen eighty-one for the Potter family vault, when your parents were officially declared dead.”

“May I read the contracts?” Harry said.

Griphook slid him the book. “Would you like some time to look it over?”

“Can I take a copy with me?” Harry said.

“You may request a self-updating copy of that book for the small fee of ten sickles,” Griphook said.

“I’ll do that, please, but I would still like to glance over the contracts before we continue this conversation.”

“Understandable. If you pay me now I can arrange for the copy to be made while you do so.”

Harry dug ten sickles out of his pocket. He’d brought his remaining five galleons and nine sickles of cash with him just in case. Four of the galleons he’d won off Hopkins back in September and the rest he’d pulled from his vault for small cash purchases. Griphook accepted the money and left the office again.

It took fifteen minutes to look over the contracts and bank statements. Without looking at too many details, it seemed like Harry’s trust vault was earning enough interest to cover the annual maintenance fee, plus some extra. The Potter family vault, on the other hand, was stagnant, and there was barely anything left in it—six hundred galleons and a list of books and artifacts, plus some old family portraits. It wasn’t losing money—something to do with deals that noble families cut with Gringotts—but it wasn’t making any, either. Also, for some reason, Harry couldn’t access any of the money in it.

He could get at the books and artifacts. Harry marked the page and kept reading.

Griphook was in fact his accounts manager, and bound by the contract not to lie to Harry about anything related to his vaults, finances, or relations with Gringotts. It was in the goblin’s best interest to act in _Harry’s_ best interest because a good working relationship between them did something to the contract’s magic that upped Griphook’s salary. Harry didn’t totally understand that part but he’d read a bit about magical contracts to prepare for this and it all looked legitimate.

That confirmed, Harry went back to the list of artifacts and books. A lot of it was heirloom jewelry or family wands, all useless, except—an _invisibility cloak?_

Oh, that would make his life _so_ much easier. And several of those books looked fascinating.

When Griphook came back, holding another copy of the black leather-bound book, Harry was ready. “Thank you, Master Griphook,” he said, trading books.

“The deal is the deal,” Griphook said. “Does that all look appropriate to you?”

“Everything seems in order. I do have some questions. Firstly, why is the Potter vault so empty? I thought my grandfather had created a successful hair potion or something?”

“He did indeed. You may request bank statements from before the vaults were in your name, but only if we notify your magical guardian,” Griphook said.

Damn. “Ah, no, that’s all right.” Harry took a breath. “Is there any way I can raise my withdrawal limit? And why can’t I access the Potter vault money?”

“The withdrawal limit is determined by the trustee set by your parents’ wills,” Griphook said. “In this case, Albus Dumbledore. Requests to raise it would be directed to him. The Potter vault, on the other hand, is under the direct purview of Gringotts as per the Nobles’ Charter of sixteen ninety.” Two years before the Statute of Secrecy. Harry wondered if those events were related. “As your accounts manager, I am in charge of the Potter vault, and the contract’s fine print—which I imagine you didn’t have time to read—limits the circumstances under which I can open it to a minor Heir.”

Harry nodded slowly. “What circumstances are those?”

Griphook almost smiled. “You ask the right questions. Good. I could possibly authorize some limited access to the Potter vault for academic purposes, if I had written testimony from an authority figure that you don’t have enough from other areas.”

“What authority figures would work? And would you have to tell anyone about this?”

“Your Head of House, magical guardian, or three separate teachers would suffice, and no. The vault is under Gringotts’ control alone.”

Okay. He could work with this. Harry sat back, mind spinning. Snape… he could _maybe_ convince Snape about this. Maybe. The most obvious tack would be the potions angle. Harry had noticed that his ingredients, bought from the discount store, looked a lot less— _useful_ than Longbottom’s, Theo’s, or Bole’s. He was starting to think that had something to do with his inability to match the textbook standard potions shades. Of course, he could play Slughorn like a fiddle, but then Harry would have to find two more teachers and he wasn’t comfortable with them. They’d run straight to Dumbledore, probably.

No. No, it had to be Snape. Awesome.

“Also, the authorization would only come into effect on your next birthday,” Griphook said. “Such authorizations are only valid the birth year after I grant them.”

He’d have to tough this year out, then. Harry frowned slightly. “All right. I’ll work on getting you the written testimony. One other thing—it says I can access the books and artifacts in the Potter vault?”

“You can,” Griphook said with a grin. “I’ll warn you that most of those books are in the vault because Lord Potter thought they were too dangerous to sell and Lady Potter refused to let him burn them. They’ll almost all be banned from Hogwarts.”

Summer reading, then. “This Invisibility Cloak?”

Griphook checked the black book. “Ah, yes, I see why you would…” He frowned suddenly. “One moment.”

Harry twirled his wand around his fingers and planned how he’d talk to Snape. Then he caught sight of Griphook’s scowl and quickly tucked the wand away. “I’m sorry, Master Griphook,” he said quietly. “I was raised by Muggles and I have no idea what the rules are for these sorts of meetings.”

“…apology accepted,” Griphook said very slowly.

“Is… the wand… offensive?” Harry said.

Griphook stared at him for a few seconds, obviously debating something with himself. Then he sighed sharply through the nose. “I only tell you this because I like you and you’ve been respectful to my people. Wands are a source of some tension between wizards and other sentient magical races. The merpeople, goblins, dryads, werewolves, vampires, and centaurs in particular. We never consented to be governed by your Ministry yet find ourselves restricted by it all the same, and without exception we are considered inferior, given ‘creature’ designation. All of us have adapted over the centuries and no longer require wands. It is still considered an affront to wave one around in front of one of us, as you would probably find it offensive if I were to sit here twiddling my spear, or if you were negotiating with a centaur who had an arrow nocked and at the ready.”

“I see.” Harry narrowed his eyes a bit. That was an impressive list of magical creatures, all of whose rights were restricted. Offering equal legal status might someday earn him some really powerful allies. Especially if they were as bitter as Griphook hinted. They hadn’t gotten to the goblin wars in History yet, but Harry had found mention of them in his extracurricular reading. Both sides were vicious and neither was solely at fault but he couldn’t blame the goblins for having some leftover anger.

It was similar, actually, to the aftermath of World War 1, and the aftermath of the last wizarding war in Britain. Harry laughed internally. The Ministry never learned.

Griphook sucked in a breath through his teeth. “Mr. Potter, I think I have your answer. The Invisibility Cloak in question is currently in the possession of one Albus Dumbledore.”

“It’s _what?”_

“Evidently, he retrieved it from the rubble of Godric’s Hollow the night you vanquished Riddle, and has been keeping it ‘for study’ with written permission of Lord Potter. However, your father’s death passes that permission to you, should you choose to revoke it.”

“I do,” Harry said instantly. “Can you get the Cloak back without him knowing, though?”

Griphook smirked. “I believe a routine audit of the vault would require all artifacts not in the possession of the vault’s owner to be returned to us, pending renewal of permission to keep them.”

Harry really doubted Dumbledore would ask. The man hadn’t told him about the second vault. It would be an interesting experiment at least. If Dumbledore didn’t say anything, then either the Cloak wasn’t valuable enough to be worth it or he was actively trying to keep Harry unaware of the family vault at all.

“That Cloak is a Potter family heirloom, and a very strange one,” Griphook said absently, still flicking through parchment. “Most Invisibility Cloaks are made of demiguise pelt and heavily enchanted, and they fade within twenty or so years. The Potter one has been around for centuries.”

There went theory one. Harry was kind of excited to see if Dumbledore would ask for permission to keep it.

“We can mail you the Cloak with heavy anti-tampering wards, or you can come get it yourself,” Griphook said. “It will take five days to enact the audit. We do not celebrate wizarding holidays and we are open on Christmas if you wish to come as soon as possible.”

“I’ll come back the twenty-sixth,” Harry said. “Might raise eyebrows if I disappear on Christmas.” Also, Snape wouldn’t appreciate babysitting him on a holiday.

“Excellent. I will expect you.” Griphook folded his talon-like hands. “Is there anything else?”

“I don’t believe so. Thank you for your… assistance,” Harry said, standing up and offering Griphook the same bow he’d given on entrance. Offering more respect now than he had before would look like flattery after the comment about Harry’s respect for goblins earning him an honest answer. Even though he was genuinely inclined to offer more respect now than he had before.

“Indeed. It is a pleasure to work with you, Mr. Potter.”

Griphook’s leer followed him out of the office.

Snape didn’t say a word on the return trip.

 

Hogwarts celebrated Christmas, so the next day, Yule went unnoticed. About ten other Slytherins were still around but he didn’t know any of them and none of them talked, so his time was spent studying or exploring the castle with Raza.

The snake was delighted to spend time out of hiding. He followed Harry around and offered rude hissed commentary on everything, including mistletoe ( _“It smells awful”_ ), kissing _(“Landplodders are disgusting. Rubbing your mouths all over one another? Exchanging saliva? Touching_ tongues? _Revolting.”)_ , the portraits _(“They are all rude and gossipy!”)_ , the library ( _“It smells musty and you spend far too much time here_ ”), and the other students _(“They are all frogbrained landplodders who make far too much noise!”)_. More than once, Harry had to stop himself laughing when someone else was near enough to see it, even though Raza kept out of sight.

The librarian, who he’d finally worked out was named Madam Pince, was slowly but surely warming to him. She reminded Harry of the grouchy Mr. Byrnes from the Ashleworth library, who really just wanted silence in his library and for people to respect the books. Harry did both and the longer he went without causing problems, the more Madam Pince got to like him. She turned out to be really helpful tracking down books and actually enjoyed explaining things.

Argus Filch was another matter. Harry still wanted to develop a rapport with him, but it was hard to even find the caretaker without causing trouble, and that was the opposite of what Harry wanted. He had a few ideas for befriending the man if he could only track him down. One involved objects charmed to help with the cleaning so Filch didn’t have to do it all the Muggle way. Harry had some limited sympathy for him, having no fondness for Muggle cleaning himself, and Filch was better than a Muggle in his opinion. He had been born to a magical family at least. And he’d stayed in their world and tried to be a part of it as best he could, even without magic.

The other plan involved Peeves and might well take years. Harry left that one on the back burner for now and threw himself into three things: the never-ending history catch-up game, potions so he could get back to beating Malfoy and Granger, and preparing his case for Snape.

 

Banging on the door woke him.

Harry rolled out of bed, jammed his glasses on his face, and yanked a uniform robe on over his awful pajamas. His hair was probably a mess and he was barefoot but he didn’t care.

“Morning,” he said, opening the door.

“Morning. Don’t think we’ve met—I’m Alen Weise.”

Non-noble, then. “Harry Potter, nice to meet you,” he said. Apparently it was some kind of insult to use noble introductions on a non-noble, like you were talking down to them or rubbing it in their face or something. Interacting on the same level was most polite. Theo said Harry should just wait for people to introduce themselves when possible because he hadn’t grown up knowing the nobles and therefore able to tell who wasn’t one on sight.

“I’m aware,” Weise said drily. “C’mon, presents.”

“What is this, a group hug?” Harry sneered.

“It’s the holidays. We might be forced into Christmas instead of Yule but we do it together. Politics suspended for a day,” Weise said. “Get your arse to the common room in ten minutes. I’m only giving you that because your hair is appalling.”

Harry shut the door in his face.

 

He walked into the common room four minutes later, hair calmed, teeth brushed, shoes on, and pajamas swapped from under his uniform robe for trousers and a shirt. Everyone else was wearing casual robes, some the traditional fully closed kind but most were in the split-front school style.

The others were second years Alen Weise and Volena Dimitrova, fourth year Adrian Pucey, third years Alia Jugson and Lucien Vaisey, fifth-year prefect Gemma Pawcett and her friend Merula Snyde, seventh years Sourav Kartik and Sylvia Newbourne, and sixth year Darius Barrow. No one really talked much but it was the first and only time Harry had ever found a relaxed atmosphere in the common room.

“Happy Yule,” Pawcett said, when they’d all finished giving out names and sat down near the hearth and tree.

“Happy Yule,” the rest of them chorused, and then as the only prefect there, Pawcett knelt by the tree and started passing out gifts.

Harry leaned back and opened a book.

“Potter.”

He looked up. “Yes?”

Pawcett and a few others eyed him strangely. “Gifts.”

Harry blinked. Realized the five floating parcels in front of him must be his. Reached out and took them very slowly, unable to turn off the part of his brain that screamed this must be a trick.

He didn’t get gifts.

“You’ve seen some shit, haven’t you, Potter?” Kartik said.

“Yeah,” Harry said. “Your face.”

That got a round of laughter and an appreciative shoulder slap from Vaisey, which he endured. People moved on to other things. He knew they hadn’t forgotten his weird reaction, and his deflection hadn’t been particularly subtle, but they took the hint and dropped it.

Another thing he liked about Slytherins. Even if they came into the House naïve, that almost always died within a year or two. Everyone had secrets to hide, and they constantly prodded each other’s weaknesses, but they also knew when to stop, as long as they weren’t up against an actual enemy. Harry had managed not to offend any of these people too badly so they would just take note of the subject change, remember it, and move on.

 Once everyone had their gifts, they started opening them.

Harry noticed that most of the others had few gifts. Probably staying on over the holidays was a sign you had families to avoid, like him. He slid his fingers carefully under the wrapping paper and broke the weak sticking charms holding it together, savoring every moment. Christmas present in Saint Hedwig’s were practical things like shoes and school supplies, all bought with their annual government funds and wrapped to pretend like they were presents instead of routine necessities. It fooled the little kids.

Well. Most of them. Never Harry.

He grinned when he saw Theo’s gift—a copy of the book on wizarding customs and holidays he’d said he was going to send Longbottom, disguised as a copy of _Hogwarts, A History._ There was a note with it.

_You’ll get this on the twenty-fifth since the castle forcibly celebrates Christmas. Happy Yule, and read up so I don’t have to watch your conversations quite so closely._

Typical Theo. In a rare bit of sentimentality, Harry kept the note tucked inside the book’s front cover.

Portia Bole had sent him a box of chocolate frogs, which was good because Harry had, after some consideration, sent her sweets as well. That Longbottom sent him something wasn’t surprising, but the gift itself was. _Burgis Longbottom’s Assorted Potions Disasters._ It was a large book. Harry smirked at it and stacked it with Theo’s.

The last two gifts made him pause. One was from Zacharias Smith, and the other was from Parkinson.

_Potter._

_I realize we are not friends, and you likely won’t have sent me anything. I’m not expecting you to and won’t take offense. However, you’ve been good to Neville, and I consider him a friend, so on his behalf, enjoy._

_Happy Yuletide,_

_Zacharias Smith, Heir of Smith._

He’d gotten Harry a simple fur-lined winter hat in the wizarding style, not pointed and shaped a bit like a coonskin hat in a bad American film. Harry would be wearing _that_ soon. It was _cold_ here in the winter and he hadn’t been able to afford anything but the required pointed hat, which he hadn’t worn since the Welcome Feast.

Parkinson’s gift was a snake-shaped cloak pin carved from some kind of black rock. The note said only:

_Potter,_

_I’ve noticed you have no House insignia. In the interest of Slytherin pride, wear this. We can’t have any of us not look the part._

_Happy Yuletide,_

_Pansy Parkinson, Heir of Parkinson_

Well, he really hoped he hadn’t started a feud or something by not getting her a gift. Also, no way could Harry afford something like this in return. He’d exhausted his funds as it was to buy sweets for Bole and a Hufflepuff scarf for Longbottom. Theo had received a small fixed-blade black-and-silver knife Harry had found in his castle explorations. He’d dug up some charms to get the blade clean and sharp and the sheath clean, and sent it off with Aoife. The owl was delighted at finally having something to do.

The other Slytherins teased him for the books, asking if he was a Ravenclaw in disguise. “I’ve just got a point to prove,” Harry said with a smirk. Snyde took the opportunity to fake glare at Jugson and make a comment about needing more academic overachievers and it dissolved into a debate about whether it was better to cheat your way into good grades or fully understand the material. Snyde, Pawcett, and Kartik thought you needed to know it because school trained your brain to be smarter even in the subjects you’d never use, and knowing the material was the best way to get the best grades. Jugson and Vaisey were more of the opinion that getting the grade mattered more than how you got it unless the class directly related to your intended career.

Only in Slytherin, Harry thought with a smile, could you have a conversation like this without even talking about morals.

He let himself have the day off and lazed around with a wizarding fiction novel, Raza coiled on his chest. At the feast, he sat with Weise and Dimitrova, and pulled crackers with each of them. Dimitrova took home a new chess set, Weise a grow-your-own-warts kit, and Harry a bottle of Mr. Whiddon’s Instant Cleaner. _Returns All Metals to a New Shine in Minutes!_ said the label. The others made fun of him for it but Harry just grinned; he knew exactly what to do with _that._

From the other Houses, only twenty total students were still at school. Weirdly enough, the Weasley Demons were among them. The two redheads had their entire section of the table in stitches by the end of dinner. Harry seemed to be the only one who found it odd that a big, affluent, tight-knit family would have two of their number not at home for the holidays.

“Hey, girl,” Harry said softly to Aoife, stroking her feathers. “This one’s a little weird, but I can never find the guy myself. Can you take this to Argus Filch right now? Don’t wait for the morning post.”

Aoife hooted happily. Harry grinned. “I’ll take that as a _yes_ ,” he said, offering her the package. It contained the Instant Cleaner and a note.

_Mr. Filch,_

_It occurred to me today that scrubbing the trophy room probably gets old and even using detentions probably isn’t enough. Also, this castle has a lot of metal in it. I’ve done my fair share of cleaning and it’s not fun._

_Happy Yule, or Christmas, whichever you prefer._

_Sincerely,_

_Harry Potter_

Raza shifted where he was draped around Harry’s shoulders. Aoife hooted a warning at him but the snake just dipped his head in her direction. Aoife cocked her head almost ninety degrees to the side and looked at him for a few seconds.

Then she hooted again, nibbled on Harry’s ear, and took off. He wandered back down to the common room listening to Raza’s commentary.

It was without a doubt the best holiday he’d ever had.

 

* * *

 

Albus watched Harry Potter leave the Great Hall and stroked his beard. Based on his time in Petunia Dursley and Sister Rachel’s minds, the boy had never had a proper Christmas. He had so hoped to give him the Cloak of Invisibility this year, and restore a bit of the magic to the holiday—both literal and figurative. It would go a long way toward soothing some of that boy’s Tom-like bitterness and resentment. Also, though in comparison it was a tiny gesture, it would begin to make up for the harm Albus had caused by leaving him with the Dursleys. He’d known the boy’s life likely wouldn’t be ideal there, but to beat him and then throw him in an _orphanage_ … 

Unfortunately, a routine Gringotts audit recalled the Cloak, and he wasn’t about to ask the boy for continued written permission to study the Hallow. On the one hand, Albus could probably manipulate him into giving it. On the other, it would waste precious influence over the boy on something rather trivial, and he didn’t fully trust himself with the Hallows anyway. The Resurrection Stone had been destroyed by the dementor used in the Horcrux-killing ritual, and he meant for the Elder Wand’s power to be broken upon his death, but the Cloak… It was perhaps the most powerful and most useful of the Hallows. Better that it be in the hands of its rightful heir.

The thought of handing an Invisibility Cloak to a Slytherin had given Albus pause, but with a small tracking charm on the fabric, it wouldn’t have been a problem. He supposed the whole thing was moot. In his authority as Harry’s magical guardian and trustee, he had gone to the goblins, and learned that Harry had made some basic inquiries about how his trust vault functioned and the limit on it. Slightly nerve-wracking—if the boy realized that Albus had deliberately limited his social and political future by restricting his trust vault, things would go sideways rather rapidly—but in the end, harmless. Mostly Albus commended the boy for thinking to ask some basic questions. Most children wouldn’t. And he knew, even if Potter could have gotten into the Potter vault, there was very, very little gold left in it. Some books, but if Lily had deemed them safe enough to keep, they were probably fine. And far above Harry’s present understanding anyway.

Things hadn’t gone too wrong. He still had years to groom the boy. And if everything went well, or _mostly_ well, having him in Slytherin might even be better in the long run. Things were different from Tom’s time; Slytherins were ostracized now and shunned, although it pained Albus to acknowledge the prejudice. There was little he could do about it and it would help his goal of keeping Harry from getting too powerful if the stigma of Slytherin forever hovered over the Boy Who Lived’s head. Meanwhile, hopefully he could force Salazar’s noble House to rethink some of _their_ age-old prejudices and alliances. Harry had at least prevented any of his House mates from tormenting him; Severus swore to bring word if that were the case. There was hope.

Sometimes Albus thought he should’ve raised the boy himself after he defeated Tom… but no. He hadn’t had the time. And his responsibilities to the wizarding world as a whole were more important than one boy, much as he hated to even think of it in those terms.

Still. Looking after the boy’s small, solitary form slipping out of the Great Hall before Christmas dinner was even over… he could not ignore the regret.

Albus sighed and added it to his already-heavy pile of burdens accumulated in his long life. Such was the price paid for being a leader.

  

* * *

 

Harry knocked on Snape’s door, expression schooled and bag over his shoulder.

“Enter,” Snape called, exactly like he had last time.

It was a little like stepping into the past. Snape was still sitting at his desk grading essays, and the rest of the office looked exactly the same. “Happy Christmas, sir,” Harry said.

“Mm. To what do I owe the… pleasure?”

Yeah, he wasn’t happy to see Harry. Shocking. “I’m really sorry to ask, sir, but when I spoke to the goblins earlier this week…” Harry took a deep breath. “I need written testimony from my Head of House for my accounts manager to authorize a release of funds from the Potter family vault. For academic purposes.”

“It seems you truly _have_ run through your pocket money this fast,” Snape sneered. “No, Mr. Potter. Your guardians may have spoiled you but I will not indulge your no doubt lavish spending habits.”

Harry’s whole body tensed. He was not spoiled and he didn’t _spend lavishly_ , he was the _opposite_ of spoiled—he wore secondhand robes for Merlin’s sake, was Snape really that stupid—

No. No, he wasn’t. Which meant he’d just been trying to get a rise out of Harry, and it worked.

Harry was abruptly furious with himself and not Snape.

“I’m told two hundred galleons isn’t enough for all my things,” he said mildly. “I’ve been working with a used cauldron and discount ingredients all year in Potions, for example, because I couldn’t afford the usual stores. My scale doesn’t work very well, and neither does my telescope. However, my trustee has set a withdrawal limit of two hundred galleons on the trust vault from my mother, and I don’t think they’ll authorize more, but for the goblins to let me at any of the Potter vault, I need your written approval.”

Snape steepled his fingers under his chin. “Two hundred galleons. The equivalent of six hundred Muggle pounds.”

“Yes, sir.”

“For… _all your things.”_

Harry realized his slip. “…yes, sir.”

“Mr. Potter. This entire meeting is conducted in confidence, along with everything you may tell me. I can’t give you what you’re asking unless I know your guardians can’t provide it for you,” Snape said, every word measured.

A few seconds ticked by.

“I’m Muggle-raised, sir,” Harry said, very softly. “I didn’t even know about any of this until Professor Dumbledore came for me on July thirty-first.”

Snape’s eyes were a fraction wider than usual. “You’re—Muggle-raised.”

“Yes.” _Unfortunately._

“And your guardians can’t pay for your things?”

“They couldn’t afford it,” Harry said. _Even if they knew about magic school. Which, no, because they’d probably call an exorcist or something._

“Who is your trustee?”

Harry hesitated. “…Professor Dumbledore, sir.”

Snape went very still. Then, abruptly, he grabbed a sheet of parchment and a quill. “Very well. You say your other supplies are insufficient, beyond those you’ve already listed?”

“My books are all used but they work,” Harry said. “I’m playing catch-up in most classes and that involves a lot of extra reading. While I’m here I have the library but over the summers I won’t. My only clothes are—Muggle or the school uniforms. About all I bought new was my wand.”

“Yet you wasted money on an owl.”

“A birthday gift from Hagrid, sir.” _Who hasn’t spoken to me since my Sorting._ Harry still wasn’t sure if he should reach out to the big man or not. He’d seemed nice, but also like he wasn’t too fond of Slytherins. And plenty of people seemed nice at first.

Snape signed the note with a rather aggressive jerk of his quill. “There. You may deliver this to your accounts manager. I expect to see you with a new cauldron, telescope, set of scales, potions kit, and limited wardrobe next year,” he said. “If you are frivolous with the funds I will be… _displeased._ ”

“Of course. Thank you, sir.” Harry slid the note into his pocket. “The goblins hoped to speak with me today, not only on this matter. May I use the Floo?”

Snape sighed through the nose. “Very well, let us depart.”

“Again, please keep all this confidential, sir,” Harry said. He did his best to sound weak even though it turned his stomach.

“As if I have a choice,” Snape said. “Which you know perfectly well.”

Harry glanced up at him. Snape was studying him with an unreadable expression, but that comment… He saw through at least some of Harry’s masks. Interesting.

Didn’t mean he was going to cut the act.

“Thank you, sir,” he said still quiet, polite.

Snape’s lip curled but he held out the pot of Floo powder.

Once again, Harry left him in the lobby of Gringotts while a goblin led him back to Griphook’s office. “Good day, Master Griphook,” he said with a half-bow.

“Good day, Mr. Potter. Sit, please,” Griphook said, gesturing with a clawed hand at the chair in front of his desk. It was new, and more comfortable than the last. Harry hid his smile. Obviously the goblin had expected him.

“You’ll be pleased to learn that our routine audit has resulted in the return of one Invisibility Cloak,” Griphook said, sliding a package wrapped in brown paper across the desk. Harry slid it into his bag with a grin he couldn’t quite contain. “Have you spoken to your Head of House?”

“Yes.” Harry pulled out the note from Snape and handed it over.

Griphook scanned it. “…I see. A full wardrobe?”

“You’ve probably guessed, but I’m Muggle-raised,” Harry said. “I owned no wizarding clothing before coming here and my Muggle clothes aren’t appropriate for Hogwarts in more ways than one.” _Ugly, badly fitted, and basically a sign asking people to pick on me._

“Good Gorsiga, that’s ridiculous. _You?”_ Griphook stared. “I’d suspected, but…”

“Yeah, that’s the general reaction.” Harry knew he wasn’t doing a good job hiding how much this bothered him.

“Your magical guardian must be senile,” Griphook said.

“It’s Dumbledore.”

“Of course it is.”

Harry wasn’t sure he could ask this, but… “You don’t seem to like him much.”

Griphook tapped his fingers on the desk in a slow rhythm. “You recall what I told you last week of the… conflicts between your people and mine.”

“We are more one people than wizards and Muggles,” Harry said with a shrug. “We have magic, they don’t.”

Griphook barked out a laugh. “A fair point, Mr. Potter, but one we should debate another time.”

“Yes, I remember.”

“Many of the goblin nation had great hopes when Albus Dumbledore was facing off with Gellert Grindelwald,” Griphook said. “Grindelwald was an elitist fool who wished to place Muggles as the bottom caste and wizardkind in the top, with sentient nonhuman species in the middle. It would have meant blatant acknowledgement of our low status rather than any kind of positive change. Dumbledore spoke of equality. Fairness. He speaks fluent Mermish, Gobbledygook, and Myquitorian. But we learned after their fateful duel that he meant equality between wizards and _Muggles_ , while he did nothing for us, nothing even for the werewolves, who can be argued are still wizards and witches or Muggles.

“Tom Riddle offered full legal rights to werewolves, and they joined him. He offered the same to the vampires, and they were engaged in negotiations with his people when he fell. We were preparing a neutral site for negotiations of our own when we heard the news, and were able to conceal our consideration of an alliance from the Ministry. The vampires and werewolves weren’t so lucky—both species have fled the United Kingdom in droves or gone Muggle to escape Ministry crackdowns after their supposedly ‘traitorous’ behavior.”

Harry sat for a few seconds and digested all this. “I apologize.”

Griphook blinked. “For what?”

“Riddle’s fall seems like it hurt you,” Harry said. “Goblins. I had a role in that, and for that I’m sorry.” He wasn’t, not really, since he’d been a baby and not actually done anything except not get killed, but it made a nice gesture. And he had meant that comment about goblins being more his people than Muggles.

“No one holds you accountable for our lost opportunity,” Griphook said dismissively. “You were an infant. Most likely your parents worked some kind of magic to save your life. Your mother was particularly skilled in charms and runes, if I remember correctly. Whatever happened, your role was unknowing and passive and not your fault. But I appreciate your apology nonetheless.” He shook his head slightly. “Enough of the past. I can authorize an extra two hundred galleons withdrawn from the Potter vault for this year.” The goblin snapped his fingers and a quill leaped to life, writing down what he said. “I recommend you outfit yourself with an extremely limited wardrobe—a few sets of casual robes, and one set of dress robes with growth charms so they last you a few years. One pair of wizarding boots, which come equipped with temperature regulation charms and growth charms. _Not_ dragon hide—those are expensive. Stick to plain leather or a synthetic. A new cauldron—”

“Why is that?” Harry said. “Other than the self-vanishing spells not working very well.”

“Your education is atrocious,” Griphook muttered. “Mr. Potter, you’ve no doubt used metals in your potions so far.”

“Yeah, iron filings and powdered sandsto—oh. _Oh_. The metal cauldron would react with the potions—unless you did something to make it neutral—and that wears off?”

Griphook nodded sharply. “Exactly so. Cauldrons are crafted with a number of spells and potions sunk into the metal to make them nonreactive. They are not simply metal soup-bowls as most Muggleborns believe. Over time, those enchantments wear off and the pewter of a standard cauldron will react with the potion.”

“This explains so much,” Harry muttered.

“Indeed. A new cauldron should last you through your time in Hogwarts and another few years after depending on how much you use it. After that, a new telescope and functioning, if used scales would not go amiss. Ask Slug & Jigger for the extended level four potions kit instead of the standard. It includes ingredients most students find only in the school stores, and it’s more expensive, but you’ll get better results with those than the dry and usually old ingredients the school stocks. Stick to used books and the Hogwarts library when at all possible.” He snapped and the dictation quill fell to the table. Griphook rolled up the transcript and handed it to Harry.

“Thank you,” Harry said, tucking it away with the Cloak.

“Yes, yes. Here.” Griphook handed over a small piece of the same grayish slate material he had on the inside of his forearm. “Press this to your vault key; it will attach itself. Present the key and chip to a teller on your birthday and they’ll authorize your wallet to draw the extra funds from the main Potter vault.”

Harry did as he was told, watching with interest as the gray slate melded seamlessly to the non-toothed end of the key.

“Good day and good fortune, Mr. Potter,” Griphook said.

“Good day and good fortune,” Harry repeated, standing and half-bowing, before he was led out of the office and back to Snape.

 

_“Did you get this Cloak artifact?”_

_“I did.”_ Harry grinned at Raza, dumping his bag on his bed. _“Let’s test it.”_

_“Yes, I can’t wait to see how stupid this thing can be and still fool landplodder—oh.”_

Harry shook out the silvery fabric. It would easily fit a rather tall man. _“Oh what?”_

 _“Oh, it smells like magic. Very old magic. Very strong.”_ Raza inched closer and prodded it with his nose. _“Perhaps it’s not so stupid.”_

 _“One way to find out.”_ Harry swung the cloak around his shoulders.

Raza shot backwards. _“You’ve disappeared!”_

Harry pushed back the cloak. _“No, I haven’t.”_

 _“Even your scent is mostly gone,”_ Raza said, tongue flickering like mad. “ _I can still detect… something off, but not exactly whose scent, or where you are. Very strange.”_

 _“Come underneath the hem,”_ Harry said, twitching up one edge. It was so weird to look down and not see his body. The Cloak was shaped like a tent with a hood. Raza slithered under the edge and when Harry dropped it, he disappeared, too.

 _“I can scent you again now. Oh, this is strange.”_ Raza stuck his tail out from under the Cloak and they both looked at it lying there. _“Very strange. And useful.”_

 _“Oh yeah.”_ Harry grinned. This was going to make the favor for Rookwood so much easier. _“Let’s go test it.”_

 

* * *

 

It was a good thing Severus’ feet knew the path up to Albus’ miniature tower so well because he was not paying attention to his travels.

Albus was Potter’s trustee. Albus had restricted his funds to what most noble families used as a year’s pocket money for their older children and expected him to restart his life in the magical world with that alone. Albus had left Lily’s son with _Muggles_.

Severus didn’t mind Muggles in the sense that he didn’t mind most inconsequential mammals. They were just fine as long as he didn’t have to interact with them much and had advance notice on the occasion that he was forced to. Most Muggles were just fine, a dangerous number were cruel narrow-minded bigots, and their worlds were better off well separated, thank you very much. If he’d cared about politics he would have been Neutral or Traditionalist—hence his support for the Death Eaters as a young man before he realized Riddle was violently insane—but he had not cared about anything but his research in years.

He supposed he cared about Potter. A bit. The boy’s welfare, if nothing else. It was appalling that such a child had been reared by Muggles. He saw how magic drove Lily away from her parents and sister; he’d grown up in the care of an abusive drunkard who hated magic and took it out on his family. He’d watched his mother waste away because she refused to use magic to protect them. (To this day, he hated her for it. Just a little.) No magical child should have to risk that but the thought of _hers_ in that life nearly got his blood boiling. 

It was selfish. It was callous. Severus didn’t care.

“Candied calamari,” he said crisply to the gargoyle. It leaped aside, and Severus stepped onto the moving spiral staircase. He didn’t bother waiting for it to take him to Albus’ office on its own, taking it like an escalator and getting to the top in record time.

“Come in,” Albus called when he knocked.

The old man was wearing casual robes and sitting sideways in an armchair by the window, several books stacked next to him. “Ah! Severus, a delight as always. I was just doing a bit of consulting work for the Department of Mysteries, would you like to join me?”

“I would not,” Severus said. “Albus, it has come to my attention that Mr. Potter is Muggle-raised.”

Albus blinked slowly and shifted so he was sitting normally. He set the book aside and folded his long fingers under his chin. Severus hated that even now, as a grown man with two Masteries and a job, he felt like an unruly student standing before Albus like this.

“What made you notice?” Albus said tiredly.

“Several things.” Severus sat down when Albus gestured to a chair. “He spends most of his time watching his fellow students and seems to have no awareness whatsoever of the proper introductions for his rank and societal position. It wouldn’t be a problem among Gryffindor or Hufflepuff nobles, and he’d get by in Ravenclaw as they’re forgiving of mistakes, but _Slytherin?_ I’m shocked he hasn’t started a feud yet.”

“It… was not my intention for the boy to go to Slytherin,” Albus said.

“That’s not the _point!_ He should never have reentered our world so oblivious.”

Albus twinkled at him. “Dear boy, have you come to care for Mr. Potter?”

“As much as I do any of my snakes,” Severus said tightly. That wouldn’t work on him, not anymore. “If you expect me to hold his unfortunate parentage against him—” _you wouldn’t have been unjustified—_ “you’ll be disappointed. He is very little like his father.”

“Indeed.”

“Where did your master plan go wrong?” Severus said, rubbing his forehead.

“I grossly overestimated the call of family.”

It took a minute for Severus to realize what Albus was saying. It took another to force himself to accept it as true. “You—you sent him to _Petunia?!”_

Albus looked away.

“Merlin, Albus, did you not listen to _anything_ Lily or I ever said about her? She is a cruel, selfish woman and she _hates magic_!” He clenched both fists in his robes to keep himself from doing something rash. “I could have told you it was a bad idea.”

“What’s done is done.” Albus so rarely looked his age, but he did now, and it was the only thing that cooled Severus’ rage. The two of them rarely saw eye to eye but he knew Albus cared about his students and would not have wished Petunia Evans on Potter if he’d known.

But no, he was so damn sure he was always right, the _great, infallible Albus Dumbledore_ , Leader of the Light, greatest wizard of their time, Merlin come again, et cetera, et cetera, so he hadn’t even bothered to consult the one living magical who’d ever known Petunia Evans before he dumped a magical child at her house.

Severus could probably bring up the withdrawal limit. As Head of House, he could dodge the confidentiality clause if he had reason to believe the Headmaster or Headmistress could solve a problem that was actively hurting a student. Part of him wanted to. Part of him wanted to tell Albus everything, leave him to his tower and his plans, return to the dungeons and bury himself in research like he had for the last ten years while ignoring the outside world while Albus handled things as he wished.

It was so tempting.

But Potter had been so obviously averse to telling the Headmaster anything. He was no doubt aware that Dumbledore had left him with his aunt. Given that, Severus could not blame the boy for distrusting Albus. In fact, if he could, he’d compliment Potter for it. Most adult magicals didn’t have the sense to distrust Albus. Also, Albus’ performance of grief and regret was flawless, but the man was a better liar than most Slytherins and he was not oblivious to general finances. He had to know that two hundred galleons was ridiculous for a Muggle-raised child to start over with in this life.

Much as Severus didn’t want to admit it, there was a game being played, and the funding restriction was part of it. Best not to let on that he’d noticed anything.

“Was there anything else, my boy?” Albus said.

Slowly, Severus shook his head, calling on all his considerable skill as an Occlumens. “No… nothing. I do wish you’d informed me of this from the beginning.”

“I doubted Mr. Potter would want it spread around,” Albus said.

“No.” In fact, the boy had done a shockingly good job hiding such an enormous weakness. Only because Severus himself had grown up in a nonmagical household and befriended a Muggleborn had he noticed, and the few Muggleborns in Slytherin were at least two years older. He was pretty sure Nott knew and they had some kind of arrangement exchanging cultural catch-up for Potter’s fame.

Until that first meeting at the start of the holidays, Severus had been sure Nott was playing Potter. He’d let it go because policing Slytherin involved letting the politics sort themselves; Severus maintained authority only by staying completely out of their squabbles and never showing favoritism. It would hurt Potter to have Severus’ assistance even if he’d been inclined to offer it. And Nott had seemed willing to honor the spirit of the exchange, and help Potter out while he used him.

Severus was no longer quite so sure that was the case.

Albus waved him off and he bowed shortly before sweeping out of the office. Deep in thought once more, Severus retraced his own steps—

And stopped dead in the middle of the entrance hall. Mind whirling. No. No, this made no _sense_. He’d assumed Slytherin prejudice, which left a bitter taste in his mouth but wasn’t surprising at this point. Albus had never been quite as unbiased as he liked to pretend, and it made sense that he might have been bitter about his little scion going to the snake house. But—

“Severus?”

He blinked and looked up. Minerva had just left the Great Hall and stopped to peer worriedly at him. “Are you quite all right?”

“Yes, thank you,” he said in clipped tones, setting off again.

Gringotts policy was for changes to vault access to take place starting when the affected parties’ year reset—at their birthdays—unless the change came directly from the vault’s owner. It couldn’t have been Slytherin prejudice because Albus had to have set that withdrawal limit before the boy’s birthday. Well before he came to Hogwarts and met the Sorting Hat.

Whatever game he was playing with Harry Potter had nothing to do with Slytherin. 

More than a little disturbed, Severus went straight to his lab and drowned his thoughts in science. He had seven years to give himself headaches thinking about Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter. He could take the rest of this horrible day for himself.


	8. wizard's duel part 2

The Cloak turned out to be a lot more useful than just the Rookwood favor. Harry, on a whim, tried poking around the teachers’ quarters in the north tower, and didn’t realize he’d gone past the student-alarm wards until he turned a corner and almost ran smack into a bathrobe-clad Professor Crouch. He skittered backwards and pressed himself against the wall until the professor quit looking around suspiciously and left. It scared Harry to pieces but once he got his heart rate under control, he realized something: the Cloak must deflect wards.

He didn’t care about the teacher’s rooms, but it was wards that kept students out of the Restricted Section. Where all the interesting books were.

 _“All right, Raza.”_ He eyed the line on the floor that warned students exactly when they were stepping somewhere they shouldn’t. _“Let’s test this.”_

_“If you have to run away, pick me up first.”_

_“Yes, Your Highness.”_

Harry tuned out Raza’s grumbles and stepped over the line.

No alarms sounded; Madam Pince didn’t come running. He grinned and started exploring the shelves.

It was kind of disappointing. All the magic and magical theory books were beyond him. The history section, on the other hand, he could understand, and as soon as he saw the titles he could guess why Dumbledore kept them out of the main library. _The Witch Hunts from a Witch’s Perspective. Muggle Religion and Magic. The Politics of Dark Magic and Censorship._

Harry ran his fingers lightly over the spines, pulled out _The Uncensored History of the Ministry_ , by Priscilla Dupont, former Minister of Magic, and began to read.

As it happened, the Cloak even allowed him to sneak books out, as long as he had them firmly inside it. Harry took _The Uncensored History of the Ministry_ with him when he left.

 

The end of the holidays ended the suspension of politics in the Slytherin dorms. Vaisey, Weise, and Dimitrova would still greet Harry when they saw him but that was the only change.

When Theo walked back into the dorm, Harry looked up with a brief nod, got a nod and a grin in return.

 

Halfway through January, Harry woke up to a stinging hex on the hand. He lay in his bed for a few seconds listening to Goyle curse quietly.

Wand in hand, Harry slid out of bed. _“Lumos.”_

Goyle froze, blinking at him in the sudden light.

“Funny, the things you can do with magic,” Harry said, twirling his wand around his fingers. “Like set wards embedded with a stinging hex around your things.”

“Potter, I dunno—”

 _“Langlock.”_ Harry’s smile curled lazily across his face in the following silence. “That’s better. It’s my turn to speak. I’ve had enough of you rummaging around in my things. Next time it’ll be nothing so kind as a stinging hex.” He was bluffing. The ward he’d used was a verbal one since Harry wasn’t nearly ready to try using runes, which that meant he couldn’t tweak it to include something other than a stinging hex. But Goyle didn’t know that.

He let the silence stretch. Goyle, the idiot, didn’t have his wand on him, and he loomed unhappily at the other end of Harry’s wand.

With a flick, Harry canceled the _langlock_. “ _Now_ it’s your turn. Anything to say?”

“I wasn’t—”

“Something other than lies and excuses. We both know what you were doing.”

Goyle paused. “What’re you going to do, then?”

Harry raised an eyebrow. “Direct. That’s new. See, I _could_ just get you to promise to leave my stuff alone, but for some bizarre reason I just don’t trust you. So…”

At this point, Goyle had the good sense to look afraid.

 

Harry woke up at seven thirty like usual, changed inside his curtains, and went about his normal routine. Theo glanced at Goyle’s closed curtains with a frown but didn’t say anything until they were ready to leave the dorms. “Should we wake him?”

“No need,” Harry said.

“Ah,” said Theo, who wasn’t stupid.

A minute later, he stopped dead in the entrance to the common room. He wasn’t the only person standing around staring at Greg Goyle hanging from a cord tied under his armpits, stuck in a Body-Bind with the word _thief_ painted on the front and back of his robes and also written on his forehead. The ink wouldn’t wash off for a few days.

Theo looked at Harry. “How’d you get the cord up to the chandelier?” he murmured.

Harry grinned. “Magic. Let’s go get breakfast.”

 

Goyle didn’t show up to class until third period Charms. He glowered at Harry from the back of the class. Even Bulstrode shunned him, sitting with Zabini and Parkinson instead. Harry half-listened to Flitwick while watching those three. Maybe he needed to worry about some kind of alliance between them. Zabini had never acted like he wanted an alliance and Parkinson hadn’t made a move of her own or signed on with anyone else. Those two and Bulstrode might be a problem.

Then again, he didn’t think Parkinson and Bulstrode could work together. They sat on opposite sides of Zabini and if looks were magic, Bulstrode’s hair would be on fire by now.

 

Harry nodded goodbye to Bole and Longbottom after their potions session.

As soon as they were out the door, he picked up his bag. “Leave my kit and cauldron on my bed,” he told Theo. “I have something do deal with.”

“Should I worry?” Theo drawled, collecting the kit.

“Only if I don’t show up to breakfast. That would mean Snape’s murdered me,” Harry said. Theo snorted.

He hovered at the door until Harry impatiently flicked a hand to move him along.

 _One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten_. Harry tugged the Cloak over his head and pulled up the hood. He disappeared from view.

A silencing spell on his shoes and he was ready. Harry ran to catch up with Bole. It was awkward and slow with the Cloak flapping around his legs but he managed to turn a corner and catch the swish of her robes almost at the base of Ravenclaw Tower.

Harry slowed down. His breathing sounded painfully loud as he eased up behind her.

“My first is in riddle, but not in little. My second is in think, but not in brink. My third is in thyme, but not in time. My fourth is in mother, but not in brother. My last is in time, and not in climb. What am I?”

Bole paced back and forth in front of the eagle door knocker, which had come alive and turned its head to watch her. “Riddle… little… R or T… think, brink, that’s um… got to be the H… uh… H again, no that doesn’t work, the Y? T H Y… then M… and E… so thyme or… No. No, it’s—Rhyme!”

“Clear logic,” the door knocker approved, and there was a clunk as the door unlocked. Bole hauled it open and Harry darted forward on her heels.

He could’ve sworn the eagle knocker turned to look as he went past, but it didn’t say anything.

Ravenclaw Tower on the inside was more or less what you’d expect. The bottom floor was a broad, open space much like the Slytherin common room, except with more bookshelves and wraparound windows looking out over the mountains instead of the lake. At least he guessed they would show the mountains if it was daylight and not foggy. Couches and chairs were scattered everywhere, and instead of chandeliers, dozens of different-sized glass balls of light drifted around over his head.

Bole vanished up a winding staircase in the middle of the common room. Harry frowned at it. In the Slytherin dorms, girls could go in the boys’ rooms and vice versa, but Longbottom had mentioned something about Gryffindor having some kind of safeguard. There wasn’t another staircase, though, so he figured it was safe.

Nothing happened by the time he got to the top of the staircase. It kept going up to the third level but Harry paused on the one above the common room. Instead of being wide and open, this floor had a tiny round space in the middle, and a single hallway stretching away between the walls until it dead-ended against a window. Harry saw a chalkboard with the words _Study Room Signups_ was written in messy handwriting. The chart underneath it was a disaster of names crossed-out, erased, rewritten, and jammed together in the same time slots.

 _So much for Ravenclaws being perfectly organized all the time_. He was tempted to explore but the risk of running into someone was pretty high and he did need to sleep tonight, so he climbed up to the next level.

And found himself in an art studio.

Harry paused and blinked. The floor was split into slices like pizza, with an open circle in the middle. At first the rooms all looked the same, messy and chaotic and colorful, but then he noted a bunch of easels in one, statues and clay things in another, an explosion of wood in a third, musical instruments in various states of deconstruction in a fourth.

The itch to explore was stronger now. He could probably find useful things in those rooms. Harry checked himself and kept climbing.

The rest of Ravenclaw Tower turned into a bit of a maze. The stairs and corridors twisted back on themselves, everyone had a private room, there were small common spaces scattered everywhere, and it didn’t have clear floor. Designing this thing must have been either an epic project or a massive headache. Or both.

It was mostly split into girls in one half and guys in the other, except without a clear boundary. Harry kept wandering into areas with girls’ names marked on the doors by mistake.

At least they _had_ names on the doors. Otherwise this would’ve taken a lot more time.

After thirty minutes of searching, he finally found the door labeled _Roger Davies_.

 _“Alohomora,”_ Harry whispered.

Nothing happened.

He frowned. He’d expected this, but he only knew one other unlocking spell, and if it didn’t work—

If it didn’t work, he would do research and come back some other night.

_“Ouveris portus.”_

The lock made a faint whining noise that drew out for a few seconds—then clunked and fell silent.

Harry waited for a count of ten, doused his wandlight, and eased the door open an inch.

The room was dark.

He crouched, in case someone was doing what he would do, which was pretend to be asleep and shoot a spell through the doorway at chest height as soon as it opened farther. None came, so either Davies was still asleep or waiting for a different chance.

Harry’s pulse pounded in his ears as he slipped into Davies’ room. Moving in this crouch was  even more awkward than running with the Cloak in the way. He only kept his balance because of years of sneaking around Saint Hedwig’s to steal food or the other kids’ things.

Slowly, he reached behind him and eased the door shut.

The room was now pitch black without the faint light in the twisting halls. Harry breathed a very soft _“Lumos”_ and fed the spell a tiny, tiny stream of power, enough for about half as much light as a candle.

The curtains around Davies’ bed were blue and closed. His trunk stood at the foot, and a wardrobe hung open off to the side with clothes spilling out. He had a wide desk shoved up under a window that had to be charmed, because it was showing stars and tonight was overcast. Papers and books were strewn over the desk and stacked next to it.

Harry went through the wardrobe. Most had a section of small shelves for toiletries, and—yep, there they were, including Davies’ hairbrush. He had watched the boy in the Great Hall and registered his longish haircut, knew it would require a brush and not just a comb, and probably leave hair behind. He poured a little more magic into his spell, holding the wand up with his left hand and squinting at the hairbrush.

Several blond hairs were caught in it.

Smirking, Harry plucked out six of them and slid them into an envelope. The envelope went back into his pocket. Rookwood would have to make that work; if he cleaned the hairbrush completely Davies might notice.

He didn’t know what locking spell the older kid had used on the door, so Harry just closed it from the outside. Hopefully Davies would just think he forgot.

Getting back out of the maze of dormitories took about half as long as getting in. Harry had to keep himself from bolting down the spiral staircase. His pulse was still racing. He was so close to being out of enemy territory but the staircase was dangerous; someone could be climbing and he wouldn’t be able to stay out of the way, not with how narrow it was.

Finally his feet hit the first level. Harry refreshed the silencing charm, looked around to make sure the common room was empty, and eased the door open. Slipped outside. Let it close.

“I cannot see you,” a musical voice said.

Harry jumped about six inches in the air and landed with his wand out.

“I heard something—but I cannot see you. It is most clever magic. Rowena designed me with vision in mind.”

“I’m… sorry,” Harry said, pitching his voice a lot higher than usual.

“Mm. I know you are not one of mine. It was difficult to say earlier as you followed the girl but now I’m sure. Next time show your face and answer a riddle, mystery visitor, or the Tower will never again open itself to you.”

“I will,” Harry said.

The knocker eagle nodded once and fell still again.

 

“Rookwood.”

Deirdre glanced over her shoulder, stopped walking. “Potter.”

The kid caught up to her, more confident than any eleven-year-old had a right to be. “You’ve been well?”

“As well as can be expected,” she said. If he didn’t get to the point soon, she was going to hex him, or just take back her offer without waiting for him to admit he couldn’t do it.

“You’re about to be better.” And he pulled an envelope out of his pocket.

Deirdre stopped dead, not caring that a Ravenclaw almost slammed into her. He glared and she hissed at him and he paled and ran away. Pathetic. “You…”

“What you asked for. Take it, you’re staring.”

Given orders by a first year. All her reputation was going to go down the drain. She took the envelope, slit it open, and peered carefully inside. Six blond hairs lurked in the bottom. A quick spell confirmed they did indeed belong to one Roger Davies.

“Impressive,” she said, eyeing the boy who’d seemed pretty uninteresting up to this point. Higgs was a lovestruck idiot even if he was good at Runes, and somehow he’d survived seven years in Slytherin with some of his naiveté and romanticism intact. Deirdre was an entirely different story. Probably because Higgs’ family wasn’t noble and hadn’t supported Riddle back in the day so _he_ didn’t have people following him around expecting his psychopathy to kick in any day. They only side-eyed him for being Slytherin and there were worse Slytherins for the hypocrites on Dumbledore’s side to focus on.

She’d have thought Potter would be like that if she gave him much thought at all. Most of the upper years had debated for weeks about why the hell _Harry Potter_ of all people was in their House, but Deirdre had stayed out of it. She had better things to worry about than a snot-nosed missort.

Then she’d spoken to him, and been amused at his arrogance. And _then_ she’d paid him a bit more attention in December and January, seeing as he was going to do a job for her. There were some weird things going on in the first year cohort that suggested Harry Potter wasn’t nearly as helpless or overwhelmed or missorted as some of them had thought. Obviously the creepy Nott kid’s loyalty, but Parkinson watched him all the time, the other halfblood ran to him for protection every other day, and no one could decide if Goyle, Bulstrode, or Malfoy hated Potter the most. 

And on top of all that—he’d managed to sneak in and out of Ravenclaw Tower without getting caught.

“Quid pro quo, Rookwood. See you.” Potter tilted his head her direction and left the way he’d come, leaving Deirdre to stuff the envelope in her pocket and keep walking to Charms.

The first and second years always played their political games in a vacuum. Potter didn’t matter yet, although he mattered more than most other firsties, given his fame. Anyone who’d been inclined to make his life hell had been leashed by the prefects, for fear of the backlash if Slytherin Harry Potter was getting cursed a couple times a week. They already had it bad enough. So she wouldn’t do anything yet, other than watch, and maybe talk to Peregrine. Deirdre seemed to remember something about Potters being good at flying.

 

“Granger, Weasley, Macmillan, Malfoy… So many options,” Harry said.

“For a fruit basket?” Theo said.

Harry rolled over on his back to glare at him. “A poisoned one, maybe.”

“Duh.”

He could get at Malfoy easiest, and Granger was the second most obvious target. Eliminating one of them would make his path to Potions superiority that much clearer. On the other hand, Harry knew real competition would push him and make him keep improving. Granger was also really hard to get to. He could follow Longbottom back to the Puff common room whenever and Malfoy was right across the hall but Gryffindor Tower was still an unknown. He _could_ do it, but it’d be harder.

Weasley had been an irritant since day one but he was an appalling potioner. He wouldn’t even notice the difference. Macmillan, though—Macmillan was rude to Longbottom and Smith, and he was a capable potioner, and he was annoying as hell.

Yeah, he made the most sense.

 

Dumbledore stood up over breakfast and made an announcement that someone had tried to break into the Hufflepuff dormitories, and they should report it if they knew anyone whose clothes were mysteriously covered in vinegar. Harry stabbed at his plate maybe a little harder than usual, because Theo looked at him weird.

That evening, Theo waited until Goyle left the room to get ready for bed. “So, is it a coincidence that I found a sock soaked in vinegar in between our beds this morning?”

“Yes,” Harry said. Crap. He’d taken his vinegar-soaked clothes to the bathroom and washed them and then hit them with drying charms. All except the Cloak, which was still drying on his headboard, because he was a little concerned aiming magic at it might mess it up. But it seemed he’d missed a sock.

Theo smirked. “Macmillan, then.”

“No idea what you’re talking about.” Harry snatched the sock back with a return grin and left to clean it.

 

“ _Okay_ ,” he muttered, two hours later. “ _So I tapped the middle barrel three rows up_ … _what d’you think? Try the fourth row or the second one from the bottom?”_

 _“Second one from the bottom, and if it’s wrong I’m blaming you for taking my advice.”_ Raza retreated down the hallway. _“Can I bite anyone if I hear them come?”_

_“We’ve talked about this.”_

_“Only if they’re going to hurt you or me, I know, I just like to check.”_

It was probably weird that the most trust Harry placed in anyone other than himself was a deadly not-actually-a-puff-adder he’d rescued from a Muggle zoo.

He took a deep breath. _Here goes_ , he thought, and tapped out the rhythm he’d heard Longbottom use on the middle barrel in the second row from the bottom.

A soft rumbling sound started and he jumped back, hoping to avoid the vinegar flood, but this time, the barrel opened without spraying everything in nasty-smelling liquid.

Harry grinned.

Leaving Raza to his lookout post, Harry crouched and stepped through the barrel. The whole stack of them disappeared as soon as he was over the threshold, leaving him in a clean, warm, earthy pathway. They were under the school’s foundations, then. Interesting. Not as deep as the dungeons or the Slytherin dorms under the lake but hidden and secure.

The passage sloped upward for a hundred feet or so. He jogged along it, sticking close to the wall in case someone sprinted down it for any reason, but it was one in the morning and the Puffs were probably all asleep.

He crept the last twenty feet and poked his head out into the common room. And almost laughed out loud at how _Hufflepuff_ it was.

Then again, some things didn’t fit the badgers’ stereotypes. On the one hand, it was earthy like the passage, warm, and homey. Fires were irregularly spaced around the large and roughly circular room. Paintings of plants crowded the walls so there was a lot of painting and not much wall. All of them had a sun or sky in them that worked as the lights, providing the whole common room with what looked and felt like natural sunlight. It was pretty dim right now. Harry figured they’d get brighter during the day. The plants fit, and so did the numerous sound-crystal players he saw scattered around the room, and so did the countless squashy chairs and low tables and worn sofas. The things that _didn’t_ quite fit were the collection of polished medieval weaponry hanging above the biggest hearth, and the fact that half the plants in the paintings were poisonous or used for nastier potions.

 _Note to self: don’t piss off the badger house_.

Harry poked around for a few minutes. The Puffs had a number of round doors leading off their common rooms. One led to a small library not unlike the one in the Slytherin dorms. Another provided access to a tiny, peaceful enchanted glen. The paintings on the walls looked like a real forest if you didn’t pay too much attention, same for the sky; the grass felt real under his feet. Harry guessed it was some kind of quiet relaxation space and retreated. Not really his style, but a nice idea if you were into that kind of thing.

Finally he found a door that seemed to lead to dormitories. Harry got halfway down the passage before he realized he was in the girls’ section, swore, and turned back. Apparently Gryffindor was the _only_ house that separated the girls from boys. He figured that was logical if you were going to take all the students with the worst impulse control and stick them in one tower for nine months out of the year.

The next door over was the boys’ section. Harry jogged down the twisting, warrenlike path, lined by more of the mismatched plant paintings giving off soft light. Other doors led off the main path to the left and right. Each one was labeled with a number or a letter. Harry guessed the numbers were for the year and the letters were other things like small social spaces or the like.

Halfway down he found a door labeled with a worn brass _1_. It wasn’t even locked. Inside all the Hufflepuff boys from this year appeared to sleep in one large and irregularly-shaped room. He counted seven beds, one more than Slytherin had in this year.

Someone had decided to make his job easier and put a desk next to each student’s bed. They had more space in the dorms than Slytherin but Slytherins were expected to find and personalize their own study spaces in the extensive and mostly unused dungeons. It was some kind of second-year rite of passage that Harry hadn’t really worried about yet. The Hufflepuffs, on the other hand, each had a desk, wardrobe, mirror, and bookshelf next to their beds, plus brightly colored rugs all over the floor.

Harry went to the nearest desk and lit his wand, examining the papers on it until he found an essay with a name on top. _Everest Crowther_. Wrong bed. He moved on to the next.

Macmillan’s was the fourth desk he tried. Harry turned from the Charms essay Macmillan must have just gotten back (with an O) and started poking around for the potions things. The Hufflepuffs all seemed to trust each other and just left their stuff out—case in point, Macmillan’s cauldron and potions kit just sitting under his bed. Slytherins didn’t even unpack their clothes into wardrobes. Harry shook his head and picked up the boy’s cauldron. Pewter, standard size 2, and no doubt almost brand-new.

Harry put his own in its place and compared them for a few minutes. There really was no visible difference, which was why he hadn’t noticed the problems with his own cauldron until Griphook explained how they were made. Perfect.

Carrying Macmillan’s cauldron, now his, Harry made his way back out of the Hufflepuff dorms. He paused in the common room and looked at the sleeping portrait of Helga Hufflepuff hanging over the biggest hearth and surrounded by the collection of weapons. She wore a burned gold dress and slumped back in a plain wooden chair, dark blond hair tied up into a complicated braid thing. The handle of some kind of tool leaned up against her leg, like a garden hoe or an ax or something.

 _Sorry about this_ , Harry thought at her. _You and your lot seem mostly decent. Macmillan’s just a prat._

The portrait shifted a bit in her sleep but didn’t wake.

 

Harry threw himself at potions. He ignored Valentine’s Day, the spring equinox, Goyle’s struggle to recover his status mainly by joining the verbal sparring against Malfoy, Crabbe, and Greengrass at every opportunity, and Roger Davies’ increasingly sickly appearance. The low-quality ingredients were more of a problem to his brewing than the exposed pewter contaminating it, but he did start doing a little better, enough to edge back into the running for the top spot. Granger split her time in Potions between scowling at Harry, Malfoy, Weasley, and her own cauldron. She and Weasley and Runcorn had a strange sort of bickering friendship but Weasley’s performance in Potions was consistently awful and Granger didn’t seem to like the interruptions.

At least Longbottom and Bole benefited from Harry’s efforts.

 

A book landed on Harry’s table with a _thud_. “Potter.”

He looked up. “Bulstrode.”

The other first-year loomed over him, trying to be intimidating. Harry leaned back in his chair and tilted his head up, propping one elbow on the table next to him. Shifting his body language into the _opposite_ of intimidated. She scowled at him and relaxed a little.

“I have an offer,” she said.

“Do you now.” Harry glanced at his open history book like it was more interesting than anything she could possibly say.

“Yeah, I do.”

“Spit it out, then, some of us are studying for the exams.”

Bulstrode glared at him. “A truce until after exams.”

“I could do that,” Harry said. It might be nice to have at least one political rival off his back while he was trying to study, especially since he was still behind in History and the extra studying for that cut into the time he could spend on anything else.

“You haven’t heard all my terms.”

“Of course not,” Harry muttered. He kicked out a chair on the other side of the table from him. “Sit down, then, and let’s talk like civilized people. And keep it down, please, I’d rather not get kicked out.” Not that Madam Pince _would,_ but still.

Bulstrode walked around the table and took the chair next to the one he’d pushed out for her. “A truce, and we study together.”

Harry blinked. “You want to form a study group.”

“Might be nice for all of us to work together for a bit, wouldn’t it? Give all the top spots to Slytherin.”

“It might,” he said slowly. She had to have an angle. A truce was simple, quid pro quo. This was something much more complicated. Bulstrode was really good at Charms and Defense, probably not enough for the _best_ score, but good. On the other hand, she was only average in the other subjects and pants at Potions.

Ah.

“So is that a yes?” Bulstrode was trying so hard to be unaffected but she leaned forward just a little as she asked that, triumph already pooling around the edges of her expression.

Harry smiled, slow and warm, and watched her triumph grow. Let her think he was agreeing.

“That’s a no,” he said kindly.

It took her a few seconds. At first she just kind of froze. Then the triumph cracked and disappeared and anger took its place. “What?”

“Next time you try to manipulate me, you should practice a little first,” Harry said, making his voice as condescending as possible. Bulstrode was swelling like a frog as she got madder. It was hilarious. “I could see it a mile off. I don’t need your help in anything but you need _mine_ in Potions.”

She looked away for a half second. He’d gotten it right, then.

“I don’t know—”

“Yes, you do,” he said, turning away decisively and picking up his book.

Bulstrode didn’t move.

Harry pretended to read for a count of thirty before he looked up and pretended to be surprised she was still there. “You can go now.”

“Potter, you wanker,” Bulstrode hissed, and drew her wand.

Harry dodged the first two curses, let a Stinging Hex hit him in the shoulder and ignored the pain, dodged a few more—

There was a _bang_ and a shriek, and Bulstrode’s wand shot out of her hand. “JUST WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING!” Madam Pince screeched, backing the girl into the shelves. Just like that, Bulstrode went from raging and confident to a scared eleven-year-old in trouble. Harry smirked at her from behind Pince’s back, dropping his own scared posture for a second.

He hadn’t _directly_ caused her fear but it still sent a curl of satisfaction through him.

“It’s fine, Madam Pince,” he said, letting his shoulders round forward and fake weakness take over his posture again.

The librarian looked over her shoulder at him. “It is most certainly not, Mr. Potter, although your House loyalty is admirable.”

“It’s not my fault,” Bulstrode protested. “Potter—”

“Potter didn’t even have time to draw his wand! Twenty points from Slytherin, whoever you are. Now _get out of my library!”_

Face ashen at the points loss, Bulstrode fled.

Harry quickly aimed his wand at his shoulder and fired an overpowered Stinger right at the same place Bulstrode had clipped him. It hurt a lot worse than her spell, and his wand was out of sight by the time Pince turned around again but he hadn’t quite dealt with the pain and she caught his grimace.

“Did she land anything?” Pince snarled, stomping over like she resented everything to do with her job. Harry, mindful of the eyes no doubt watching between shelves and around corners, straightened but didn’t hide the pain on his face.

“It’s fine,” he said.

“You’re hurt.” Pince sighed through her nose and muttered something about disrespect for the sanctity of a library.

“It’s _fine_ ,” Harry insisted. “I just won’t come here as much, is all. She knows I study a lot.”

Madam Pince looked appalled. “Not come—! I won’t have it.” She glared fiercely around and several people skittered away. Pince lowered her voice. “I’m going to your Head of House and getting that girl’s access _restricted_. What’s her name?”

Harry swallowed. “M-Millicent Bulstrode, ma’am. I… thank you.”

“Don’t thank me,” she huffed. “I won’t have one of the rare respectful students chased out of _my_ library because of some spell-happy brat. Get your things and go to the hospital wing. I’ll be asking Poppy if you went or not, so don’t skive off.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” Harry gathered his books and homework and left the library.

He went to the hospital wing and was given a salve for the impressive welt on the front of his left shoulder. Madam Pomfrey wanted to keep him for a few hours but he charmed his way out of it and made his way down to the common room to deal with this.

Theo was waiting at the base of the east tower. “What happened?” he demanded.

Harry looked at him with raised eyebrows.

“Sorry. What happened?” Theo repeated, with a much politer tone.

“Bulstrode proposed a truce in the library, at least until after exams,” Harry said. “That I might have agreed to, except she wanted to start a study group. I called her bluff—she just wanted to use me to pass Potions. I pissed her off but I didn’t think she’d be so stupid as to _attack_ me.”

“Not everyone our age has your freaky self-discipline,” Theo said.

Harry smirked. “Or yours.”

“Yeah, well, we had unconventional childhoods. Why didn’t she come crawling back to us in pieces?”

“Because this way, Pince and Pomfrey think I’m the victim,” Harry said, dropping into his pained-but-bravely-dealing-with-it posture and slightly strained voice for a second. Then he brushed it off and went back to his most natural mastk, cold and collected. “Bulstrode will make some call in the common room about me not having time to draw my wand, I’ll say I just had the sense not to start shooting off spells in the middle of the library, she loses face.”

Theo shook his head. “You… ah, the Bulstrodes have—a temper. A lot of the old families have hereditary traits—family magics tend to influence it. The Blacks can be really reckless. The Malfoys are weirdly good with languages and never seem to be able to have more than one kid per generation. The Bulstrodes have tempers.”

“And you think I’m underestimating hers.”

“…possibly.”

Harry nodded slowly. “Noted. Another duel?”

“Depends on how mad you made her in the library.”

“Pretty mad.”

Theo nodded. “Yeah, another duel’s not unlikely. She might even make it into a family insult thing. I mean, she _shouldn’t_ , but she might, ‘cause then it has to happen immediately and you and Bulstrode wouldn’t be able to tell your seconds what terms. If that happens are there any terms I should ask?”

“Could I ask galleons?”

“Yeah, but then she’d probably do the same. Plus, for the Bulstrodes, money’s no issue, so it would basically tell people that you need the cash.”

“Like they couldn’t tell from my robes. But fine. Public humiliation it is.” Harry smirked as a thought occurred to him. “She has to publicly—meaning in front of at least two students from other Houses—announce that halfblood Harry Potter is better at magic than she is.”

Theo hissed out a breath. “You’ll make an enemy of her _and_ her brother.”

“Perseus, right? Fifth year?”

“Yeah. He’s one of the top ranked, I’ll point him out when I get a chance. Also Carter Avery from his year and Ivanna Raynott in seventh. I’d bet Rookwood, Bletchley, and Derrick will be shooting for Avery and Bulstrode next year but it’s only April, that could change. You’ve still got a month and a half to deal with the older Bulstrode if he decides to get involved.”

“Don’t worry about that.” Harry half-smiled. “I have a few favors I can collect.”

“Do I get to know who?”

Harry thought it over. “Rookwood and Higgs are the main ones.”

Theo tripped. “Higgs I’m not surprised at, but _Rookwood?”_

“Mhm.”

The question practically radiated off Theo in waves, but he didn’t dare ask, to Harry’s private satisfaction.

“Davies,” he finally said, when it was obvious Theo wouldn’t say anything. “Noticed how he looks a little ill lately?”

“The Ravenclaw Beater?”

Harry had to think about the Quidditch teams. He didn’t pay much attention to who was on them. “Yes. Rookwood wanted a bit of payback on behalf of a friend. I supplied the means.”

Theo looked confused, so Harry reached up and tugged on a bit of his own hair.

“You... Merlin. My life was so easy before this year.”

“But it was boring.”

He snorted. “True.”

Harry broke the silence as they approached the common room entrance. “Here we go… Runespoor.”

At first, no one even noticed them. Both boys sat down in an unoccupied couch; Theo pulled out a set of Exploding Snap cards and started a single-player game while Harry got to work on his essay.

Theo nudged Harry’s foot with his and glanced over Harry’s shoulder.

Casually, Harry turned so he was sitting sideways on the couch and could look to his right.

Bulstrode had sat down with Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, Parkinson, and Hopkins. The whole group was laughing, and Bulstrode was doing a dramatic reenactment of what Harry realized was himself dodging her hexes. Several nearby older kids were watching with amusement.

Cleverer than he’d expected, actually, to not come at him directly. He almost smiled. A decent challenge—now that was something he never got at Saint Hedwig’s. All the Muggle kids were crude and went with open violence, petty thievery, or clumsy rumor-spreading.

“Go find Davis,” he said softly, scribbling a note on a scrap of parchment. “Then get this to Rookwood, subtly. Tell Davis…”

Theo listened to the plan, nodded almost invisibly, stretched, and wandered off toward the dorms. No one else noticed him go.

 

* * *

 

(Harry was, as it happened, wrong about that. One other person noticed.)

 

* * *

 

Carter Avery liked the balconies. He always had, ever since he’d been a first year, ostracized and bitter and lonely. Grandmother Caxus would take him to Diagon Alley and and they’d sit on the roof of Whizz Hard Books, their only source of income after the Ministry seized the family vault’s contents, and she’d tell him stories while they watched the people below. Being up in the balconies reminded him of that. Also, Grandmother had taught him how Slytherin worked. The balconies let him watch everything. Political rivals, power plays, possible allies, the ever-shifting web of allegiances and secrets and friendships and loves and hatreds. From up here, it was all laid out like a chessboard.

Grandmother always said he should have been in Ravenclaw if not for his burning ambition.

So he’d sat and watched and built his mental files of people and walked into his third year, when the political games began for real, armed with the knowledge of what made all his rivals tick. One by one they’d fallen until only Perseus was left to challenge him in his year. Ivanna, two above, was the unquestioned top, but she’d be gone and then Carter had a clear shot at effectively ruling Slytherin for his last two years. If he could just get Perseus out of the equation. They had fairly equal support bases in their year and in those immediately above and below, which were most important, and Carter had better grades but not by enough that he could reasonably use that against Perseus. He liked school well enough but it didn’t come as easily as calculating people.

Snape had given the prefect’s badge to Adam Boyd, an aggressively neutral party, so their Head of House didn’t interfere with the politics, as usual. All year, Carter had been angling to weaken Perseus as Perseus had him, while Boyd mediated and saw to his prefect’s duties and mostly stayed out of it. Slytherin was unusual in that the prefects were almost never the students with real power in the House.

Even with all that effort, neither he nor Perseus had managed to gain an edge. Which was why Carter was paying such close attention to the situation with Perseus’ sister.

The girl had come in this year. She’d probably have some stunning curves in a few years, especially if she followed her reported childhood dream of becoming a Beater and put on some muscle, but she hadn’t hit puberty yet and for now she was just bigger than most of the other kids her age. She used it well. Greengrass and the rest of the girls just couldn’t physically intimidate anyone the way Bulstrode could. Even most of the _boys_ their year couldn’t, the exceptions being Crabbe Goyle with their size, and Zabini because he was tall and weirdly pretty for an eleven-year-old.

Perseus had expected the Malfoy heir to be his sister’s biggest opposition. They had all been rather stunned in October when Malfoy had his arse handed to him by Harry Potter, who’d been quiet, unassuming, respectful, and neutral until then. He and Crabbe had been struggling ever since and it was Greengrass and Parkinson who Bulstrode focused on.

Carter, watching, had thought all year that they were overlooking an obvious threat. Something was off about Potter. It was difficult to spot, and Carter only did so because he was quite good at analyzing people, but that kid… He was showing the world a mask. Throwing himself into studying and the quiet conversations he had in the corners with Nott.

That alliance was another weird thing. At first he assumed Nott was in charge but he watched their little corner discussions from above and Nott was _deferring_ to Potter. All the while, Potter charmed his teachers, deflected any challenges that came his way but started none of his own, and tentatively dipped his toes into the favor-trading business with Longbottom, Bole, and Higgs.

He had a few possible explanations for Potter’s oddities. Nott he understood. Their families were in similar positions, although the Nott kid had it somewhat worse. Potter, on the other hand—well, the explanation that best fit Carter’s observations made no sense at all, but the evidence was the evidence. It explained Potter’s diffidence _and_ the weird alliance—Nott was using Potter, helping him avoid social mistakes and winning his goodwill, influencing him from behind the scenes. With that in mind, there was no way Nott had warned Potter about the dangers of taking on Bulstrode openly. Perseus would get involved, Nott would step in and smooth it over, and he’d earn Potter’s endless goodwill.

The Potters, after all, were known for loyalty and kindness, not ruthlessness.

He smiled thinly when Nott pointed out the younger Bulstrode’s spirited mockery, even more when Nott wandered off to the dorms on some pretense or other a few minutes later. Distancing himself from Potter’s sinking ship. He’d come swanning back in when Potter won the duel and Perseus got involved. Carter firmly believed this was the most likely outcome because say what you wished about the Boy Who Lived but the Malfoy duel and his class performance said pretty clearly that he was no slouch with magic. On the other hand, Perseus Bulstrode would never sit back and let his baby sister get taken down by a halfblood.

Carter snorted. Blood purity politics could be an excellent tool but the Bulstrodes were too rigid in their thinking, and it made them predictable and limited. He put no stock in blood himself, only politics and closeness to the Muggles, although he’d let a select few of his stupider supporters believe his opinions on blood were rather harsher than was the truth. It helped soothe their ingrained prejudices.

A few other upper years were keeping an eye on the proceedings, mainly Rookwood, Bletchley, and Derrick from the third years. All the contenders for the top spot after Carter and Perseus. Mostly the first years’ squabbles were ignored but when it dragged a contender for Slytherin leader into the mix… well, then they got their attention. Rookwood in particular was watching not Bulstrode but Potter. She was clever, difficult to read, and untouchable despite her political weakness outside the House and family history. No one wanted to cross the girl raised by Viscount Burke.

Merula looked up. She’d been his confidant and right hand since he rather soundly bested her in their third year, and then offered her a position in his circle as an alternative to social annihilation. He had been impressed by her as they duked it out and chosen her as an ally rather than Perseus because, unlike Perseus, Merula wasn’t a rigid thinker. She’d taken the offer gladly and he had never once regretted it. Least of all now, when she unerringly found him half-hidden in the shadows.

Carter tipped her a nod. She would get Darius and Olivia, and they would play the situation however it fell out to weaken Perseus as much as possible. They were under orders to extend Nott an offer of alliance in the moment so he had no time to think; he’d be forced to accept or go down against Perseus. Potter would no doubt get dragged along but Carter could offer _him_ much more protection and information than Nott, and he’d find uses for that fame. With the Boy Who Lived backing him, even as a second year, Carter’s shot at the top next year was almost assured. Carter himself would only get directly involved in this spat if all else failed. Perseus was the hands-on type. Carter preferred delegation and observation.

Nott reappeared. Carter frowned slightly. That was unexpected. Nott would’ve been better off waiting until Potter was about to fall before he stepped back in; now he’d be associated with the approaching disaster in everyone’s minds.

And he was followed by—the other halfblood this year. Davis—Tracy Davis. Neutral family that almost never made waves, they’d disowned a cousin for supporting Riddle but played to both sides. No Wizengamot seat, and unnobled, but they could trace their family back almost as long as any noble and there was plenty of money in their coffers.

All this went through his head in a flash as Davis made her way across the common room. Very slight shifts went through the groups who were present and pretending to study or relax. Less than half the House was in the common room at the moment but the important players were.

 Davis had been hanging off Potter some this year, he remembered suddenly. Using him as a buffer against Bulstrode’s mindless blood-purity attacks. Possibly Nott was calling in that debt and throwing her to the sharks to soften Bulstrode up by proxy, get her mad. It was a good move considering the Bulstrode temper. Just unexpected.

He looked around for Nott. The kid had taken a detour for some reason and was now approaching Potter again. Maybe Carter had given him too much credit. The detour let him dodge the attention landing on Davis but he was still getting too involved too soon. Carter’s lips thinned. Possibly this plan wasn’t going to work after all.

Eh. He had several backups and Merula would be waiting for the signal to switch to any of them. It would pan out. If things proceeded apace, Nott would be even more desperate when Olivia jumped in, and even more likely to accept her offer.

Davis sat down with Bulstrode’s group. Her nervousness was visible even from where Carter stood as all of them turned on her in unison. With the exceptions of Parkinson and Hopkins, these were the radical blood purists of her year. And she was a halfblood.

 

* * *

 

Harry was too far away to hear but he knew what Davis was saying, because he’d planned it.

 

* * *

 

Tracy sat on her hands so no one could see them shaking. She _did not want to be here_. But Potter had shielded her all year, probably for this exact moment, and she’d lose that protection if she didn’t step up. Tracy wasn’t stupid and she didn’t lie to herself. She didn’t have the cunning or guts to match with most of her classmates on their level, and she’d come to school knowing that if she went Slytherin she’d have to find a stronger ally. Greengrass already had her miniones, Bulstrode and Malfoy would never take her, and Nott was a non-starter with his family’s mess.

So it had been Potter, starting from the first night when he drew Bulstrode’s fire off Tracy’s blood status and shot them all down.

She forced a bright smile at the hostile-or-amused looks aimed her way. “So, Bulstrode,” she said, a little louder than absolutely necessary. “How come you lost us twenty points this afternoon?”

Bulstrode’s face darkened instantly.

 

* * *

 

The points won and lost each day were recorded in a chart below the hourglasses, but only prefects had access to the individual tallies. Other Houses’ prefects might leak the information but Slytherin’s never did. Neutrality was part of their job description. Unless it was for doing something against Slytherin’s rules, they’d never tell who lost how much.

That left only the rumor mill.

Harry smiled to himself.

 

* * *

 

Carter didn’t know what Davis said but it got to Bulstrode. The girl’s expression darkened much like Perseus’ did when he was angry. Parkinson and the other non-noble girl’s eyes got wide; Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle looked shocked.

He glanced at Potter and did a double-take. The kid was smirking to himself, hiding it expertly in a book but Carter was an expert with more experience and he caught it.

Nott sat down and said something.

 

* * *

 

“Twenty?” Parkinson said in disbelief. “Millicent, how in Circe’s name?”

Bulstrode scowled. “It was Potter’s fault.”

“That’s not what I heard.” Tracy spun a bit of hair around her finger. It was a Parkinson move and the other girl’s eyes homed in on it instantly. “I know a Ravenclaw who was there, you know. _She_ said you guys were talking, and then you just started hurling curses unprovoked, and Pince chased you out.”

The noise level in the common room dropped. Tracy’s hands started sweating. Actually all of her was sweating. Why in the name of Circe was a _first-year_ fight getting so much attention?

“Did your Ravenclaw minion tell you how Potter didn’t even have time to draw his wand?” Bulstrode sneered. “I almost took him to pieces.”

“I dunno.” Tracy frowned. “He beat Malfoy. _I_ think he just had the sense not to start shooting spells in the library. Madam Pince is going to Snape to get you banned for the rest of the year for it.”

Bulstrode paled a bit. A library ban this close to exams was bad. Even through her fear, Tracy smirked a little at that look on Bulstrode’s face. It felt good to get some jabs in after a year dodging her.

Parkinson and Malfoy swapped a glance. “I think I’ll go work on my Charms essay,” Hopkins murmured. “Pansy, would you mind helping me out a bit?”

“Not at all.” Both of them stood. “Want to come, Davis?” Parkinson asked.

Tracy blinked. Glanced at Potter and Nott, sitting somewhat nearby. Potter’s eyes flickered between the girls and he nodded, barely visible.

“Sure,” she said with another bright smile. Anything to get out of here.

 

* * *

 

Davis looked to Potter instead of Nott. Carter wondered if, possibly, he’d miscalculated.

He still found it highly improbable that a likely-Muggle-raised halfblood _Potter_ of all people had gained Nott’s loyalty. But that was looking to be the case more with every moment.

 

* * *

 

Bulstrode got deliberately to her feet. Walked toward him with anger in every step.

Harry didn’t look up until she loudly cleared her throat. “Oh, hello, Bulstrode,” he said pleasantly. “Good afte—”

She launched herself at him.

Harry only had a fraction of a second before the bigger girl slammed into him. They both went flying off the couch. Hit the ground. Rolled. People were yelling. He was no stranger to physical violence and got a knee between them and hurled her off with a heave and a pulse of magic.

They fell apart. Harry used his momentum, rolled again and came up in a crouch, his wand already in his hand. Bulstrode was up almost as fast with her own wand out.

 

* * *

 

Carter stood up straight. She’d attacked without issuing a challenge, and done it Muggle-style. She was angrier than he’d thought—what had Potter _said_ in the library?

They went down. Bulstrode was bigger and he was sure for a second that Potter was going to get his face pounded in. People surged to their feet around them, yelling at the sudden outbreak of violence. Potter rolled and somehow hurled Bulstrode away. The boy snapped up into a balanced half-crouch, wand in hand and a positively _feral_ expression on his face. Eyes cold, teeth bared.

Carter caught Merula’s eye and flashed two fingers. She nodded once, snapped her fingers at Darius and Olivia.

 

* * *

 

Tracy turned around when she heard the shouts, and then added her own scream to the mix. She couldn’t help it. Bulstrode had _tackled_ Potter. No one _did that._ Potter was done—

Except he wasn’t. Somehow he threw Bulstrode off and hopped up. Tracy couldn’t help flinching back from him, either. He looked more than a little terrifying. More than a little like he might kill someone.

 

* * *

 

A shimmering shield appeared between Harry and Bulstrode. Her spell ricocheted off it and Harry let his own _protere_ die. Merula Snyde had stepped out of the crowd and cast the shield.

“An immediate challenge has been issued,” she said loudly, silencing the gathering crowd. “If you want a second, they must stand now.”

Theo elbowed his way out to stand at Harry’s shoulder instantly. There was a wait of a tense few seconds before Goyle came to stand as Bulstrode’s second.

“Terms,” Snyde barked. “No communication between seconds and duelists.”

Theo grinned. “Potter’s been attacked without provocation twice today, including once like a _Muggle_. If he wins, Bulstrode’s got to announce in front of at least two people from other Houses that halfblood Harry Potter is better at magic than she is.”

 

* * *

 

Carter heard the terms easily; the whole common room had gone silent except for the whisper of bets being placed and money changing hands. He sucked in a breath with the rest of Slytherin at the terms but only a few people in the House would see the significance of this.

Contrary to popular belief, there weren’t that many Slytherins who had a problem with blood purity. They tended to be wary of Muggleborns because they were often fucking annoying and socially inept, but Darius Barrow was Muggleborn and he was Carter’s best friend after Merula, and the reason Carter had been able to spot the signs of probably Muggle childhood in Potter. A few others had done well for themselves in-House. Including ‘halfblood’ in their terms meant Nott and Potter knew who they were going up against, if not about her brother. They knew how to hit the younger Bulstrode where it hurt. More, they’d _planned this._ Davis. Nott’s presence sooner than Carter had anticipated.

He was beginning to wonder if he’d possibly been temporarily fooled by a Muggle-raised firstie. The plan would work, but _still._

 

* * *

 

Bulstrode’s expression was ugly but she nodded.

Goyle hesitated for a few long seconds. Everyone hung on his silence.

“If Bulstrode wins, Potter’s got to wait on her publicly for the rest of the year, no matter when or what it is,” he said finally.

Another intake of breath. Harry tightened his grip on his wand. Magic pounded in his blood, ears, fingers. Goyle had come up with something not quite as creative as Bulstrode would’ve but still no joke. He’d have to work _hard_ to come back from that next year. Plus, she could ask him to do things during class, during _exams…_

He had to win.

“I don’t know what kind of magic you two know, but keep it civil,” Snyde ordered. “First and second year spells only. We don’t need to drag two firsties up to Pomfrey in buckets from Dark curses.”

Everyone deferred to her; she had to be one of the power players’ lieutenants. Her eyes kept flicking to a tall broad-shouldered boy with dark eyes and the same hair as Bulstrode except shorter. His arms were crossed and his attention was firmly on Bulstrode. Perseus. Theo had pointed him out subtly while they plotted, fixing a name to the face Harry had already marked as related to Bulstrode and a power player among the older students.

“So mote,” Harry said.

“So mote,” Bulstrode snarled.

He grinned at her through the shield between them. Harry hadn’t expected to _miss_ the many opportunities he had at Saint Hedwig’s to dish out violence, but he found himself excited at the prospect of hurting her a bit.

You could do a lot of damage just with first-year spells.

“Seconds, step down.”

Theo and Goyle retreated.

“And… Mark!” Snyde dropped her shield.


	9. politics and children are unkind

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't leave you all with that cliffie for more than a day ;)

The Bulstrode girl fought like Perseus, all offense and power, landing one heavy spell after another on Potter. She had a good arsenal and better aim. He dodged like people threw things at him a lot, and he was quick with his shields, but he was also on the retreat.

Bulstrode advanced one step. Another.

Carter sighed. He didn’t want to use the fallback option, which was in place only if Bulstrode won this little duel. It involved sabotage and other things generally frowned upon for taking the in-house political battles out of the House. But if Potter lost…

Then the boy switched hands. Bulstrode barely dodged a spell that she couldn’t shield against in time. They didn’t know _protego_ , only _protere_ , which was a lot smaller and single-use. The change in angle on his attack wasn’t much but it threw her off. Let him start forcing her on the defensive.

Potter recovered. His wand darted from one hand to another. Where Bulstrode was all power and heavy blanket fire, he was speed and finesse. Carter was reluctantly impressed. Ambidextrous dueling with wand-switches was not easy. Several of the Quidditch set were eyeing him with real interest; speed like that hinted at Seeker skills and Higgs hadn’t found a replacement.

He forced Bulstrode back. People dodged out of the way. She was almost to the wall, where she’d get pinned and inevitably hit. Even with first-year spells and a few from second year, even clumsy and careful with his wand in the way that you only saw from people who had never held one until eleven, Potter was good.

Then Perseus nodded in his sister’s direction.

Oh, shit. Carter wasn’t the only one who’d planned for this—when had Perseus gotten a plan to his sister? They hadn’t spoken since the girl came back in bitching about Potter.

She dodged and used the second her wand was free to shout something very much _not_ in the first year curriculum. Even _Carter_ was surprised by how Dark that was and he’d done his share of Dark-classified magic. A jet of dark purple light slammed into Potter’s _protere_ , overwhelmed it, and tossed him straight back.

His wand skittered away out of sight.

The only reason he stayed in was that that much magic left Bulstrode temporarily weak. _Get up_ , Carter willed Potter. _Come on. Get your wand and get. Up. Tackle her if you have to and take her wand._

The boy rolled over. Groaned. Got to his hands and knees.

Bulstrode staggered upright. Her wand was at her feet. She leaned down to pick it up.

Potter’s head snapped up. He had that same feral expression from earlier.

Carter narrowed his eyes.

As Bulstrode lifted her wand, Potter surged to his feet and held out a hand. She was picked up like a ragdoll and hurled into the wall that she still stood pretty close to, and then slumped to the ground in a moaning heap.

Carter was dimly aware that his mouth was hanging open. Wandless magic, from a firstie. Potter didn’t look surprised. Or weakened. Only pissed.

Wandless magic, and had it been _deliberate?_

Potter walked forward in dead silence. Halfway to Bulstrode, she moaned again and one hand flopped, reaching for her wand. Face twisted in a sneer, Potter held out his left hand and Bulstrode’s wand shot into it fast as a hummingbird.

He stopped over her and nudged her ribs with his toe. “Oi,” Potter said. “Wake up.”

Bulstrode groaned.

Potter sighed. “Someone hit her with some healing spells so we can finish this like civilized people, with words.”

Gertrude Meads, sixth year and apprentice Healer with Pomfrey, stepped forward nervously. She started work in a low voice, tracing healing spells and runes over Bulstrode’s body. For almost a full minute, her voice and the fires were the only sounds.

Carter eased sideways and made for the stairwell while everyone was distracted. Merula caught his movement, but she was the only one.

 

* * *

 

(Carter was, as it happened, wrong about that. One other person noticed. His name was Theodore Nott, and he smiled in a way that might have frightened even Carter Avery if he’d seen it.)

 

* * *

 

Carter hit the ground floor just as the Bulstrode girl groaned and sat up slowly. “Pot…ter,” she growled. “Bastard.”

“I think I liked _halfblood_ better,” Potter said. His voice carried, cold as a glacier. “At least that one was true.”

Carter glared at a couple of third years. They cleared out of the way until he was standing near the edge of the open space the crowd left for the duel. Not _quite_ at the edge, because that was Perseus’ style to be front and center, but close enough to see Bulstrode’s eyes fix on her wand in Potter’s hand.

“Oh, you noticed.” Potter smiled a little. “See, Bulstrode, you kept whinging that I couldn’t even draw my wand in the library today. I _could_ have, as it happens, but I think we can all see I don’t need a wand to best you.”

He spun Bulstrode’s wand idly around his fingers. Raised an eyebrow.

“No,” the girl spat. “You don’t.”

“Glad we’re on the same page.” Carter smirked. Muggle idiom. No one but Muggleborns and their friends would notice, and then only possibly because some Muggle idioms had made their way into the Hogwarts lexicon over the years. “Someone correct me if I’m wrong—” Potter’s tone suggested he did not, in fact, expect to be wrong—“but Millie here broke the arrangements of the duel. I don’t know that last spell but I’m fairly sure it’s not in the first or second year curriculum.”

And, oh, the kid had _balls_. He was looking at Perseus as he said it. Carter started to smile for real. Potter had caught the little mid-duel communication. He knew who was pulling the strings here.

He was sure now that somehow, Potter was in charge of Nott. The deference was real.

“It wasn’t,” Perseus said finally.

“So I’d be well within my rights to snap this.” Potter toyed idly with Bulstrode’s wand and half the crowd choked. Carter’s smile turned into shock. Potter was correct, technically.

Even Perseus knew it. He nodded like it pained him. “You would.”

“But a wand is an extension of a witch’s magic, and I’d really rather not deliver that kind of insult. I’m nice like that.” Potter smirked. “So, Perseus—I can call you Perseus, right?—I think it’d be fair for Millie to take my terms and _also_ hers, in reverse. Serving me for, what, a month and a half, that’s fair for a wand, isn’t it?”

Perseus looked at his sister, sitting at Potter’s feet and her wand at his mercy. Carter saw the battle in his eyes. Save the sister’s wand and drag out the pain, lose a lot of his own standing in the process, or let her suffer the consequences, save his status, and shred Potter into pieces later.

He’d go for the second option. Potter would fall next year or the year after. He knew it, too; his tension was well-hidden but not invisible. He needed Perseus to make the dumb choice.

Perseus was a lot of things, but never dumb. The decision was almost written in letters on his face as he reached it and Potter’s tension increased. This was a golden opportunity. Carter would step in now and Potter would owe him, would need his protection until Perseus was gone.

He caught Darius’ eye, tilted his head just slightly toward the circle.

Darius stepped forward, opened his mouth.

“That’s fair.”

Carter blinked. That was a girl’s voice, and it wasn’t Olivia’s or Merula’s. Darius stopped and shut his mouth, looking to Carter for direction. He shook his head slightly. _Wait._

When he saw who’d spoken, Carter’s mask slipped in public for the first time in over a year.

 

* * *

 

Deirdre elbowed her way out of the crowd. People shifted behind her but she ignored them, focusing on Perseus and fulfilling her debt. She was even more sure now that owing Potter a favor had been a good call. She’d never liked Perseus or Carter much—Perseus was annoyingly narrow-minded and Carter thought he could just plug people into algorithms and predict them perfectly. It was even more annoying because he was usually right. Today, though, he’d been outmaneuvered, and she got to stick it to both of them at the same time. The shock and horror on Carter’s face alone was worth any social damage control she’d have to do after this.

“Like Potter said, to have your wand snapped is to have a piece of you broken,” she said. “An insult like that… well, I’d almost rather be a Squib than lose _my_ wand.”

Perseus’ jaw tightened even more. If he got much madder it might snap. He didn’t have a choice now, not with Deirdre having thrown those words onto the board, and everyone knew it.

There was blood in the water and the sharks were circling.

“…fair,” he said. “Millicent.”

The girl closed her eyes. “So mote.”

Deirdre wanted to laugh. This was a memory she’d be showing Uncle Nile in the Pensieve when she got home. He was bedridden and didn’t get nearly as much entertainment as he used to.

Potter pointed Bulstrode’s wand at her. For a second, the girl flinched, thinking he was about to curse her—probably half of them expected it; he’d be within his rights, again—but he just held it out and they realized what he was _actually_ doing. Humiliation. Forcing her to take her wand tip-first, a serious insult but one she couldn’t challenge or deny.

To her credit, Bulstrode’s hand was steady as she did so.

Potter patted her on the cheek and turned away. He looked in the direction his wand had flown. There was a sudden flurry of activity as people in the gathered crowd, a little over half the House strong, looked around for his wand. Lucien Vaisey popped out a second later and passed it over to Potter with a crazy grin. Potter nodded at him and slid it back into his pocket.

For a second, there was silence.

A very faint smile flickered over Potter’s face. He bowed shortly in no particular direction and went back to the couch Bulstrode had originally tackled him off of. He picked up his book, sat down, and went back to his essay like nothing had happened.

Deirdre caught a few eyes and made a few subtle signals as the crowd slowly broke up into chattering groups. Bridget Spire and Lucien Vaisey were her allies a year down; Pascal Haigh was the only one in her year. They’d been angling to deal with Bletchley and Derrick next year while Carter and Perseus were distracted with each other. This was a huge power shift. Not as big a boost for Carter as he’d been hoping but it was still a blow to Perseus. Her people needed to reevaluate.

Asten had been on the fence. Deirdre caught his eye and raised a brow.

He slowly shook his head.

She felt her lips thin, but nodded acceptance and kept moving, making her way for the common room entrance. Lucien, Bridget, and Pascal knew where her private study room was—a secret most Slytherins kept to themselves or only a trusted few. They’d meet her there. She had hoped to get Asten too, but she knew since the bargain with Portia he’d been waffling toward Potter and it seemed he’d made his choice.

Deirdre could live with it. After all, she and Potter had an excellent working relationship and they were too far apart in age to really challenge each other, so Asten wouldn’t work against her, even now. It wasn’t that great a loss.  

 

* * *

  

Harry and Theo waited an hour and a half. People trickled out of the common room, creeping off to their secret dungeon bolt-holes to discuss or think. Perseus Bulstrode and Carter Avery were both holding court in the common room, Bulstrode to save face and Avery to use on his rival’s loss. Harry pretended to not notice them or the dozen other quiet groups of students shooting him curious, appraising looks. He and Theo talked about mundane topics in light tones and didn’t let their masks slip.

When his homework was done and the tension had eased, he said something about going to bed to Theo and left the common room at a casual pace. Eyes tracked his departure.

Only when he was back in his room, without Goyle, did he let his shoulders slump and his body fall against the closed door. Eyes shut, breath shuddering.

Holding it together for the last hour and a half under all those clever, cunning eyes was the most exhausting thing he’d ever done.

He steadied his breathing, stilled his mind, got himself back under control. Such an expenditure of wandless magic was _tiring_ , especially when his whole body still hurt from whatever Bulstrode shot at him. His shield blocked the worst of it but still.

Someone knocked softly on the door.

Harry rearranged himself. The short break had made it easier. He slid on the Slytherin mask, cold and unreadable, and opened the door.

Theo.

A little of his composure slid away. Not enough to show anything important but enough to make Theo feel like Harry trusted him.

His right hand came inside and shut the door. “You okay?”

“Tired,” Harry said honestly. “Do you know what her last spell was?”

“Didn’t recognize the incantation. I can ask Father over the summer.”

Harry nodded. He’d appreciate it. “I don’t think there’s any lasting effects and I don’t really want to go to Pomfrey.”

Theo frowned.

There was another knock.

Harry grimaced very briefly before he put the mask all the way back on. Nodded to Theo, who opened the door.

“Bole?” Theo said, obviously surprised.

“Can I come in?”

Theo glanced over his shoulder. Harry raised an eyebrow. Theo nodded. Harry returned the gesture and Theo stepped aside, letting Bole into the room.

He hovered awkwardly near the door. Theo leaned on the wall and did the creepy stare. Bole looked at him sideways. “I’m guessing you don’t want to go to Pomfrey for the spell you took,” he said.

“Clever of you,” Harry said. He really just wanted to go to bed and hope the ache went down by morning.

“I know some basic healing,” Bole said. “Not as much as Meads, but you pick up on some things when you’re a Slytherin Beater. I can do some diagnostics and make sure you’re not going to bleed out or die.”

“Why?” Theo drawled.

Bole looked at him sideways again. He couldn’t seem to decide who was the bigger threat, Theo or Harry. “My sister likes you,” he said. “Frankly I think you’re both a lot creepier than any firsties have a right to be but that’s her business. Also, Bulstrode’s been driving me into the dirt for years.”

Revenge, then. Or at least siding with a rival. Harry glanced at Theo.

“I accept,” Harry said. Everyone in the room knew he was accepting more than a minor healing. “Have at it. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you _only_ medical spells.”

Theo’s hands went to his pockets. One had his wand and the other most likely held the knife Harry had given him.

“Of course,” Bole said, flicking his wand out of a forearm holster into his hand. He aimed it at Harry’s chest and started tracing wand movements. Mumbled strings of incantations undercut the look of intense concentration on his face.

Harry’s ribs itched, along with something deep in his chest, and he squirmed a little.

Theo tensed. Harry flattened his right hand with his thumb pressed to his leg and palm facing backward. Theo stopped, but he didn’t relax.

The itching faded and Bole put his wand down. He looked a little unsteady on his feet. “Your shield blocked the worst of it—just the blunt striking force got through. Pretty much all your internal organs between your navel and shoulders are bruised but nothing serious. Just take it easy for a few days and you’ll be fine.” He grimaced. “If you _hadn’t_ shielded, I think everything inside your ribcage would be liquefied.”

“Thank you,” Harry said. Something squirmed in his stomach again but it had nothing to do with magic this time. Liquefied. He’d almost been _liquefied_.

Bole jerked, like he’d gone to bow and then stopped, froze for a second, nodded his head, and turned around. “Goodnight, Potter. Best of luck on your exams.”

“You too,” Theo said sweetly, and smirked when Bole flinched on his way out.

Goyle showed up shortly after. Harry eyed him, but he kept his eyes on the ground and didn’t seem inclined to pick any fights. Theo was in bed in his pajamas reading. Harry sprawled over his own bed, still in his robes, with a fiction novel and a ball of light conjured wandlessly over his head. He was showing off a little, so what. The whole House would know that he had some wandless capabilities by morning.

He laughed a little and ignored the looks he got from his roommates. Wait until he played the Parseltongue card and set Raza on them.

Five minutes before he was going to sleep, someone knocked _again._

“Bloody hell,” Theo groaned, rolling off his bed without being asked. He marched over with a scowl. Harry’s mask was firmly in place from having Goyle in the room so he didn’t have to do anything except roll over and sit up.

Theo yanked the door open and paused.

“Carter Avery, Heir of Avery,” an unassuming voice said.

“Theodore Nott, Heir of Nott.” Theo got his poise back and leaned on the half-open door. Harry made extra sure his mask was solid. “How’s your evening?”

“Enough games, Nott, we both know why I’m here.”

Theo shrugged. “Suit yourself.” He stepped back and let Avery into the room.

The fifth year looked at Goyle, frozen on his bed, then at Harry. “Get rid of that.”

“Goyle, exercise some brain cells and realize when you’re not wanted,” Harry said, not even looking at him. Goyle stomped out with a growl. Three seconds later, the door across the hall slammed shut.

“Gone whinging to Malfoy,” Theo said with a smirk. He shut their own door harder than necessary and sat on his own bed.

Avery eyed their dorm. He was the only one standing but somehow it wasn’t awkward. His face was the sort you’d pass on the street and forget about five seconds later; he was slim, neither unusually short nor tall, still and composed with his hands behind his back. Robes perfectly tailored but not the most expensive. Haircut neat and plain. Designed to not catch attention.

“You duel well.”

Harry tilted his head a bit.

Avery sighed and sat on the edge of Goyle’s bed like it pained him to go near anything of Goyle’s. “I’ll be direct, since I think we both just want to go to bed at this point. I had hoped to have one of my allies do what Miss Rookwood did for you.”

“I have no intention of crossing you but I also don’t want to owe you,” Harry said.

“Don’t you now owe someone else?”

Harry let his lips quirk into a smile. “Do I?”

Avery paused. “Ah. Your favor-trading. I hadn’t noticed one with Miss Rookwood… which I suppose speaks to your discretion. Not quite as much, I think, as another of your secrets.”

“Have you come to blackmail me?” Harry said. “Because I think we’d both enjoy that conversation more on a full night of sleep.”

Avery laughed a little, and Harry knew he’d pegged the older boy right. Both of them were in this not only to get support and position to carry out other plans, but also because they enjoyed it. The mental challenge, the planning, the satisfaction of beating someone. Harry was still feeling the pleasure of slamming Bulstrode into the wall and then humiliating her and her brother in front of everyone.

“Not blackmail,” Avery said. “Just a civilized conversation. Do you know Darius Barrow, from sixth year?”

“I know the name,” Harry said.

“Tall, blond hair, one of mine.”

Harry thought back. He hadn’t been paying that much attention to the crowd, being more focused on Avery, the Bulstrodes, and Rookwood, but… “Yeah, I saw him.” 

“He’s Muggleborn.” Avery tapped his fingers on Goyle’s bed. “I can feel your shock, Nott. There are Muggleborns in Slytherin. Four at the moment, I believe, although I won’t hand you the others’ names. Darius has been my acquaintance since second year and my ally since third. I mention it because I know better than most purebloods the things Muggleborn students have to learn when they come to our House.”

Harry could see where this was going and it left a bit of cold fear in his stomach.

“And oddly enough…” Avery looked at Harry. “I see many those things in you.”

It wasn’t that hard to twist his lips into a mocking smile, or tilt his chin up and relax his shoulders, or say, “Are you proposing some conspiracy theory that I’m not Lord James Potter’s son?”

“Some might,” Avery said. “Foolish people might. I am not a fool. Until tonight, I couldn’t accept it, because the thought of the Potter heir and Boy Who Lived growing up Muggle was ridiculous. I thought surely even Albus Dumbledore isn’t that stupid.”

 _Yeah, me too_.

“But it’s the most logical explanation, and the most logical explanation is usually the right one.”

“And here you said you weren’t blackmailing,” Theo sneered.

 Avery shook his head. “I’m not. I don’t plan to tell people. Mostly I’m impressed you’ve hidden it this long. Darius suspects, but he does as I do politically, so.”

“You have no proof,” Harry said. “That’s why you can’t really tell people.”

“The time to have taken advantage of you would have been the beginning of this year, or at least before you absorbed so many of Nott’s lessons,” Avery agreed. “I assume that’s the trade here?”

Harry and Theo grinned at each other. “Part of it,” Theo said.

“Hm.” Avery studied them. “Interesting. In any case, I’m also pretty sure you have a backup plan in case rumors of you being Muggle-raised were to spread.”

“You’re not wrong,” Harry said.

“So it’s not very useful information to me.” Avery shrugged. “You outplayed me tonight, I admit it. I underestimated you and I won’t make that mistake again.”

Harry chose his words carefully, to respond to that warning. “Like I said, I don’t want to challenge you. Tonight was only an issue because of Perseus, and… my situation. You’ll keep him busy the next two years, and I get the sense we’re too far apart in age to be real political enemies.”

“Agreed. Truce, then?” Avery said.

“So mote.”

“So mote. One more question… how do you feel about Muggles?”

Harry’s face tightened. He really needed to get that reaction under control. “I’m… not a fan, let’s put it that way.”

Avery muttered something that sounded a lot like _Dumbledore fucked up_. “Neither is Darius. Goodnight, Potter, Nott.”

“Goodnight,” Harry said, nodding his head since technically Avery was a lot better placed than him.

He and Theo sat in silence for a few minutes.

“Think we can trust that arrangement?” Harry said.

“As much as you can… ever trust… Avery,” Theo said through a yawn. “He hates Perseus and you still cleared him a path for the next two years, plus he’s right about Barrow now that I think about it, so blood’s not a sticking point for him. He won’t take you out just for that. ‘N he’s smart enough to know he could prob’ly weaken you with rumors about your… childhood but not enough to be big and then he’d have you to deal with as well as his own rivals.”

Harry nodded. “My thinking, too.”

“I’m going to sleep. We have class tomorrow.”

“Really? Never would’ve guessed we have classes at school.”

“…shut up.”

 

After the duel with Bulstrode, the rest of the year was downright boring.

Harry did his homework, traded favors, tutored Longbottom and Bole in Potions, and studied for exams. Slytherin settled down pretty quickly. Both Bulstrodes were subdued and Avery was taking advantage of it, Rookwood and Bletchley were gearing up to have at each other the next year, and Greengrass and Parkinson were jockeying for Bulstrode’s power vacuum, but Harry mostly stayed out of it and they let him. He’d make a move in third year when it counted and Avery was on the way out, and when Harry had a better handle on this world.

Roger Davies left school in mid-May and went to St. Mungo’s Hospital. His illness was reportedly clearing up even though they had never figured out what it was, which Harry took to mean Rookwood was letting him live. He’d have to take his exams during the summer.

Longbottom mentioned once that Macmillan had been sucking in Potions lately, which left Smith at the head of the Hufflepuff cohort in that class. Longbottom thought it was awesome and never guessed that Harry had anything to do with it. Theo eyed Harry’s cauldron when it came up and smirked, but never asked.

It was hilarious having Bulstrode have to do things for him. Harry didn’t actually exercise it much. Her public announcement had set off a firestorm of rumors that only died down in pre-exam panic, and it was perfectly satisfying to watch her stew and worry over what he might ask her to do. Mostly he just picked petty, meaningless, irritating tasks like handing him things that were within his reach, returning his books to the library, or holding his bag for a few seconds while he rummaged through it. He didn’t want Perseus out for blood even more because Harry rubbed salt in the wound.

They sat exams. With the exception of History, Harry thought he’d done very well. His pineapple tap-danced flawlessly in Charms, to Professor Vihaan’s reluctant approval. His snuffbox in Transfiguration was very handsome and Slughorn spent five minutes praising Harry’s Forgetfulness Potion at the end of their Potions exam. Astronomy was just filling out a star chart and thanks to Longbottom, Herbology was a breeze. In Defense, Harry demonstrated the Knockback Jinx, Jelly-Fingers Jinx, Stinging Hex, and _protere_ shield without batting an eye. After Bulstrode, it was a cakewalk. 

History was the last exam. He spent an hour in the sweltering Great Hall answering questions about goblin wars and the connection between magic and early Muggle religions. Harry thought he’d done pretty well overall, given how behind he’d been at the beginning of the year, but definitely not top marks.

 

The day after exams ended, four days until the end of term, Harry knocked on Snape’s door.

The Slytherin head opened it and scowled at the sight of Harry. “Yes, Potter?”

“Sir, I’d like to request a meeting with Professor Dumbledore,” he said. “About my—summer living plans.”

Snape’s dark eyes saw way too much. “I believe he’s unoccupied this afternoon, Mr. Potter. I can accompany you to his office now.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Harry’s stomach got progressively queasier the farther they walked. He didn’t _show_ it but—there it was.

He would give a lot to never go back to Saint Hedwig’s.

“You caused some waves in Slytherin of late,” Snape said at one point.

“I’ve been doing that since my Sorting,” Harry said.

Snape huffed. “I suppose it was inevitable.”

Harry remembered Bulstrode’s terrified, embarrassed face, the gleam of unshed tears in her eyes. A smile ghosted across his face. “Yeah, it was.”

 “Hm.”

Snape stopped at a gargoyle. “Blood Sucker,” he said, one lip curling.

Harry frowned.

“A wizarding sweet,” Snape said with a sigh, as the gargoyle leaped aside and they both stopped on the base of a moving spiral staircase. “Marketed towards vampires.”

_Oookay._

At the top of the stairs, Snape stepped off and onto a landing that faced an ancient oak door. He rapped sharply.

“Come in.”

The door swung open on its own. Harry followed Snape inside.

His eyes widened a little; he couldn’t help it. The office was—interesting. Spindly metallic instruments, ancient books, and weird artifacts cluttered the floor-to-ceiling shelves that wrapped around three-quarters of the circular room. The remaining quarter of wall was solid window, looking out over the lake and Quidditch pitch and mountains. One of the giant squid’s tentacles was sticking up out of the water.

Professor Dumbledore smiled at him, eyes twinkling, from behind a large, ornate desk. “Harry, my boy! Wonderful to see you.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Have a seat. Severus, you may go.”

“Actually, sir, I’d prefer he stay,” Harry cut in. “As my Head of House.”

“Of course.” Dumbledore’s twinkling got stronger. That had to be unnatural.

Snape sat down to Harry’s right, very stiffly.

“Lemon sherbet?” Dumbledore offered Harry a tin of sweets.

“Er, no thanks.”

Dumbledore shrugged and popped one in his mouth. “Muggle sweets, I know, but I find them delicious. I have heard excellent things from your professors about your exam performance, my boy, excellent things. I won’t say which but you earned extra credit on four of them.”

“That’s reassuring,” Harry said with his best shy-and-charming grin, gloating internally. “I admit I was pretty nervous, with—my background and all, that I’d be behind.”

“Not to worry, not to worry, we do our very best to make sure our courses are available to all students no matter their childhood.”

 _Yeah, at the expense of the magic-raised kids who have to go slow for the Muggleborns to keep up_. “I’m sure the other Muggle-raised students appreciate it as much as I do.”

“Now, what can I do for you today?”

Harry took a deep breath. “I’m not Muggleborn but you’ve been named my magical guardian anyway, according to my parents’ wills, right?”

“Indeed.” The twinkling got still brighter. Yeah, definitely not natural.

“I’m not—asking to room with you,” Harry said hurriedly. “I wouldn’t want to impose but—you see, the orphanage isn’t… very pleasant. I have nothing against the Sisters of Saint Hedwig; they’re really nice and they really mean their commitment to helping children—but the other kids can be cruel. Is… I was thinking I could stay in Hogwarts over the summer. The house-elves have nothing to do and I could study in the library to catch up in History—in my other classes I’m doing well but I’m really behind there, growing up Muggle and—I would need your permission, of course, sir, as Headmaster and my guardian, and…”

He trailed off as Dumbledore shook his head with a sorrowful expression. “I’m afraid it’s not possible, my boy,” he said heavily.

Harry’s stomach fell somewhere around his toes. For a second his masks all fell and he couldn’t do anything but stare at Dumbledore. Betrayed.

This man—his parents had entrusted him to this man. He was supposed to _look after Harry_.

“Hogwarts does not permit students to stay on over the summer. It’s simply not possible. I’m very sorry, my dear boy, but the orphanage is your home.” He checked a pocket watch. “I had intended to speak with you on this matter, actually. Professor Snape will escort you back to Saint Hedwig’s to protect you on the journey, and once you are there, I must ask you not to leave for the duration of the summer. I have spent this year erecting wards to protect you in your home now that you have rejoined our world. There are, unfortunately, many who still wish you harm for one reason or another, despite all you represent to our world and the work we have accomplished in the last decade. Anonymity will serve you better than staying at Hogwarts or with a friend, where the world may discover you, or where you may put said friend at risk.”

And just like that—Harry’s masks snapped back into place.

 

* * *

 

He ducked his head and let his shoulders round forward in disappointment. “I understand, sir. I—didn’t want to be a bother but—I had to ask.”

“I truly am sorry.” Professor Dumbledore sighed. “I have been working for years to provide more integration between our world and the Muggle one—” _That is a terrible idea,_ Harry thought with horror that he did not show.

 

* * *

 

 _That is a terrible idea_ , Snape thought with weariness that he did not show. 

 

* * *

 

“—and if I may set humility aside for a moment, I have been in most respects successful, but you are a… special case, Mr. Potter.”

 _You’re damn right I’m special_ , Harry thought as he made appropriately disappointed-but-accepting noises. _But not because of a scar or because you think you can play me. I’ll_ show _you how_ special _I am._

Snape didn’t say a word the whole way back to the dungeons. Harry was grateful, because it left him the time to think, and get himself under control. Snape’s apolitical status included not revealing any weaknesses he saw in his students to the others, so it galled Harry but didn’t worry him to be less than completely in control of himself around his Head of House.

His parents had entrusted him to Dumbledore’s care. Harry struggled with the fact that he suddenly kind of hated them for that. He chose to believe they were stupid enough to be manipulated into it because the other option—that they were bad people who knew Dumbledore was the sort of person to stick their magical kid in an awful Muggle orphanage for a whole summer and left Harry to him anyway—was too depressing to think about.

And Dumbledore. Integrating magicals with Muggles. Putting Harry in that Merlin-damned orphanage. Not only leaving him there but refusing to let him have any contact with the outside world besides owl post. Putting a stupidly low cap on his finances, trying to keep him contained at every turn, probably watching this summer via Mrs. Figg—

Maybe even before.

Harry’s stomach fell even farther.

“Mr. Potter, would you like a cup of tea before you must return to your dormitory,” Professor Snape said.

“No, thank you.” With an effort of will Harry slammed his Slytherin mask back into place. Usually he’d use the respectful student mask around his professors but Snape saw through that one and the cold, closed Slytherin face was the most natural to Harry. He hoped one day if he worked enough it might just be his default expression and not a mask at all.

Snape studied him for a moment. “You may owl me this summer, Mr. Potter, if at any point you need assistance. The… characteristics that Salazar favored are often fostered in children who grow up in… unsavory environments. Not all, of course, but the house of snakes receives more than its fair share of such students. You would not be the first to request my help and you will not be the last.”

“Thank you, sir.” Harry already knew he wouldn’t do that unless he absolutely had to. Another of his rules— _never ask for help if at all possible_.

Snape waved him on with an irritated jerk of his hand. Harry stalked back to his dormitory, kicked Goyle out so he had the room to himself, and called Raza out from under the bed. He spent thirty minutes ranting in Parseltongue. Raza’s vicious commentary and increasingly clever insults aimed at Dumbledore eventually calmed Harry down to the point that he could go to dinner and behave normally.

Inside, he was making plans. Mrs. Figg showed him her hide-a-key, she had a Floo, and she spent every other weekend up in Cradley with a friend visiting the farmer’s market during the summers. It wouldn’t be that hard to get into her house and slip off to Diagon for a few hours. He could dig some of those questionable books out of the Potter vault if any of them was within his reading level, spend some of the money he’d scraped up with small favors at the used bookstore, and hole up in his room at Saint Hedwig’s the rest of the time.

It would be awful and he would probably put at least one stupid Muggle kid in the hospital but it would work.

 

The last few days of term seemed to fly by. The next thing Harry knew, it was the last day and he was getting his exam scores back.

“How’d you do?” Theo said, catching up to Harry outside Snape’s office.

He checked behind him to make sure none of the other first years were in earshot—Crabbe was staring at his grades in horror, and Harry smirked—then passed his scores over to Theo.

“Of course you got almost all O’s,” Theo sighed. “Why am I not surprised.”

“Foresight,” Harry said, snatching it back. He was fine with the Es in History and Charms. The former he was way behind and the in Charms he just didn’t have the comfort around magic that the magic-raised kids did.

Well. No, he wasn’t _fine_ with either score. He’d topped every subject other than those two and Herbology, where Longbottom got the rare O+ and set a record on the first-year exams. His only comfort was that Bole had the top score in Charms and Smith in History, and Harry could stomach coming second to two magic-raised students whose intelligence he respected. Only this year, and only because he was at a disadvantage.

“How’d you guys do?” Davis said, falling in on Harry’s left. Theo smirked and Harry elbowed him.

“Mix of Os and Es, one A in Astronomy. You?”

Davis smiled proudly. “Mix of Os and Es, too, but no A.”

“Ah, bugger off, Davis.”

“You, Potter?” Davis said.

He half-smiled. “Two Es, four Os, and two O+s in Defense and Transfiguration.”

“Congratulations,” Davis said, eyes a bit wide. “That’s… really impressive.”

His half-smile turned into a full-blown smirk. “I know.”

“Arrogant tosser,” she huffed, still grinning.

Harry supposed, as far as followers went, Davis was tolerable. Certainly less annoying than she could’ve been, and not unintelligent. Maybe next year he’d suggest they switch to first names.

They made their way to the Great Hall. Avery and Bulstrode and their courts were fighting for the seats of honor at the end closest to the doors, Bletchley and Rookwood were squabbling just below them, the Quidditch team and Derricks’s supporters about a third of the way down, then came the Slytherins who weren’t in the running for the top slots or their courts, and finally the firsties and second-years at the foot of the table nearest the staff table. Avery caught Harry’s eye and tilted his chin a fraction, a gesture Harry returned. Rookwood winked at him and Bole smiled slightly from his seat with Derrick and Flint and the other Quidditch players and their fans.

At the foot of the table, Harry sat with Theo on one side and Davis on the other. Parkinson and Hopkins beat out Greengrass to sit across from him; she huffily retreated down the table with Zabini and Vane dancing attendance. Harry wondered if Zabini’s attention was a real allegiance or just him doing his usual dance of neutral-but-on-everyone’s-good-side. Bulstrode, Goyle, Malfoy, and Crabbe were at the very end and they were bickering. He grinned at the sight.

“Check it out.” Elio Cohen, a second year, leaned around Gianna Rossi to grin at the firsties. “Green banners! We’ve won the House Cup!”

Harry looked up and sure enough, the banners that usually depicted the Hogwarts crest had all been turned green and emblazoned with the silver-and-green Slytherin crest.

“We’ve only got it two out of the last eleven years now,” Dimitrova said. “Used to be we had it almost half the time but…”

“But the war happened.” Everyone stared at Theo. “What? Sugarcoating is for babies.”

Alen Weise was the first to laugh. “You’re crazy, Nott.”

“Yes.” Theo grinned, and Rossi, next to him, recoiled a bit. “I’m aware.”

“Don’t mind him, he hasn’t had enough dinner,” Parkinson said, neatly defusing everything. She did that thing where she trained her dark, slanted eyes on Harry and it felt like she was analyzing every inch of him. He quirked his lips and returned the favor.

“Where’s Quirrell?” Hopkins said suddenly. Everyone turned to look at the staff table and confirm that, indeed, the OWL Muggle Studies professor was missing. “Mum asked me to say hello to him before I left, they were school friends…”

“Weird.” Parkinson shrugged and dismissed it. “Not like we need Muggle Studies anyway.”

Harry sneered reflexively.

They talked about exam scores—everyone was appropriately impressed by Harry’s—until Dumbledore finally arrived and stepped up to his ornate podium, raising his hands for quiet.

“Well, that’s another year gone!” he said cheerfully. “And I must trouble you with an old man’s wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast. What a year it has been! Hopefully your heads are all a little fuller than they were… you have the rest of the summer to get them nice and empty before the next year begins, or we teachers will be out of a job!”

“Does he just suck down a Babbling Brew before he steps up there?” Harry grumbled. Muted approval and amusement radiated around him in the subtle, wordless Slytherin form of communication.

“Now, as I understand it, the House Cup needs awarding. The points stand thus: In fourth place, Gryffindor, with three hundred and twelve points; in third, Hufflepuff, with three hundred and twenty-two; in second, Ravenclaw, with four hundred and twenty-six… and finally Slytherin with four hundred and seventy-two.”

The green-and-silver table broke out into cheers and stomping. Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff clapped politely, the Gryffindors sullenly, but Harry was too busy banging his goblet on the table to care.

“Yes, yes, well done, Slytherin,” Dumbledore said, smiling their way when the celebration died down a bit. The whole table fell warily silent.

Harry’s stomach felt sick. No. No, he was _not_ going to take this away from them—

“However… recent events must be taken into account.”

“He can’t do this,” Davis said, stunned.

Weise was already slumped over his plate. “Yeah, he can. Just watch.”

“I have a few last-minute points to dish out. You see, three days ago, one of our professors thought it might be amusing to attempt to steal some highly classified research that was residing in my office.” Dumbledore sighed through the nose. “I myself was foolishly away, placing more trust than was evidently due in my staff and the wards of Hogwarts. However, three enterprising young students happened to be out of bed at the time. Points have been taken and detentions assigned for breaking curfew but I have decided they ought to be rewarded, as well. Their intervention delayed the thief long enough for other staff members to arrive and intervene, although he managed to escape.”

The entire hall was staring at him, the Slytherins with horror, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff with shock, the Gryffindors with sudden delight.

They knew who the students in question were.

Harry scanned the table. Looking for a sign. It had to be a few of the upper years if they’d held off a staff member—

“To Mr. Neville Longbottom, I award Hufflepuff twenty points.”

Hufflepuff cheered, and Longbottom looked happy, but he was still half-frowning. He caught Harry’s eye and mouthed, _I’m sorry._

Harry wasn’t mad at _him_.

“To Mr. Edward Runcorn, I award Gryffindor fifty points.”

The red table burst into cheers. Weasley and a few older boys slammed Runcorn on the back, whooping like monkeys.

“To Miss Hermione Granger, I award Gryffindor fifty points.”

More cheers. Granger’s bushy hair was all Harry could see of her; she appeared to have burst into tears and planted her face on the table.

The hall fell dead silent.

“Finally, to Mr. Ronald Weasley, I award Gryffindor House… sixty-five points.”

There was a half second of quiet and then—then it was as if a bomb went off.

Gryffindors were cheering, jumping up and down, screaming, hugging one another and especially Runcorn, Granger, and Weasley. Celebrating their unfair and unearned victory.

It took almost ten minutes for the chaos to die down so they could finally eat. Half the Gryffindors were crying and most of the Hufflepuffs had completely forgotten Longbottom’s minor victory.

Several lions even stood up to boo or mock the Slytherins across the Great Hall. Harry had to hold Theo down. “Rossi, _help me_ ,” he snarled at the frozen girl on Theo’s other side, and she snapped out of it and grabbed his other shoulder. He wasn’t the only one. Derrick appeared to be talking very fast to placate the Quidditch team and Avery was holding Bulstrode at wandpoint, probably to keep him in his seat. The only time either would step in to keep the other from getting in trouble was when the greater reputation of Slytherin House was at stake.

The End-of-Year Feast was the second-to-last full, good meal Harry would get for quite some time, and it only tasted like ash in his mouth.

 

He climbed onto the train the next morning with his trunk in tow. Everything was packed, including eight books smuggled out of the library (two from the Restricted Section) under his Cloak. If they were never checked out, Madam Pince wouldn’t be able to track them, and Harry wasn’t going to be able to get his hands on new reading material over the summer because of Dumbledore’s rules.

Just the _thought_ of the man left him seething in rage.

Controllable rage, though, because Harry wasn’t in Slytherin for nothing. He carefully put it all behind a wall in his mind where he could look at his anger and use it to fuel him when he had to but where it didn’t make him stupid or reckless. Sometimes that technique had been the only thing that kept him from setting Saint Hedwig’s on fire with everyone inside and just walking away.

Bole waved him into a compartment she was sharing with another boy. Harry walked in and heaved his trunk up into the rack. The other boy introduced himself as “Terry Boot,” so Harry just went with “Harry Potter” and sat down.

Theo had vanished as soon as they got on the train and said only that he was going to go fetch something. He showed up five minutes after Harry sat down dragging his trunk, Longbottom, Smith, and Davis in tow. The four of them piled into the compartment and sat down, introductions were passed around, and then they all looked expectantly at Longbottom.

He sighed. “Don’t get mad at me.”

“We’re not mad at _you_ ,” Theo sneered.

Smith kicked him. “Take it down a peg, Nott.”

Theo glared back, the really creepy glare, but Smith just stuck his nose in the air and ignored him. Theo was so surprised he actually forgot to keep glaring. Even sixth-year Slytherins had flinched away from Theo when he went all creepy-murderous-Nott-heir on them.

“Longbottom… can you explain, please?” Harry said.

He took a deep breath. “Okay, so… I was down at the greenhouses late ‘cause Professor Sprout had this plant that only blooms at midnight. I _had_ a pass. And I was walking back through the school, in a weird place because I came in this back door one of the older Hufflepuffs showed me, and then I heard them talking.” He made a face. “I wanted to know what they were doing so I went to look, and then Weasley dragged me along so I didn’t slow them down—apparently Snape suspected Quirrell was doing something weird and Dumbledore wouldn’t listen, so Snape threatened Quirrell on his own, and the lions overheard and they thought _Snape_ was trying to steal from Dumbledore. And, um, Weasley’s mum told him, and Mother told me the same so I know it’s true and probably not going to be a secret anymore—but Snape was a Death Eater.”

Both Ravenclaws gasped. Davis flinched.

“Reformed,” Longbottom said hurriedly. “He turned spy before the end and—and helped us win. But he _used_ to be one, so Weasley and Granger and Runcorn all jumped to conclusions, and McGonagall wouldn’t listen to them so when they heard Professor Dumbledore was gone they ran off themselves. I thought they were being ridiculous and I was going to go get a teacher but Hermione hit me with a Body-Bind.” He shrugged, turning a little red. “I got the _protere_ shield up but not fast enough, so… yeah. When I woke up, Professor Sprout was there and Crouch, Vihaan, and McGonagall were fighting Quirrell. But he escaped while they were trying to get the Gryffindors to safety.”

“That is the _dumbest_ thing I have _ever_ heard,” Harry said finally.

Bole shook her head. “Like Dumbledore didn’t have _wards_ on his office! Like they couldn’t have gone to a _different teacher,_ but _no_ , just _one_ person doesn’t believe it so they go and sneak out and—they got a hundred and sixty-five points for _that?!”_

“Also, no offense, but what were your twenty for?” Theo said.

Smith snorted. “’Doing the right thing,’ which I translated as “not being an absolute idiot,” but our professors are too nice to the Gryffindors to say that.”

Everyone laughed. Boot looked a little uncomfortable but still amused.

Harry seethed at the favoritism. It was ridiculous. Slytherin had _earned_ those points, against the majority of professors being biased morons who wouldn’t give Slytherin credit when lions did half as much work and had their asses wiped for them. Meanwhile, the Hufflepuffs were written off as duffers and the Ravenclaws as hopeless nerds. Having been in both their common rooms, Harry was _sure_ neither of those things was true, and it was a stupid system that crippled the wizarding world. Houses were supposed to be subdividing a big family into slightly smaller interconnected families, not bitter warring states tied together by an alliance they all resented.

He paused with a frown. Harry hadn’t realized he felt that strongly about the idiocy going on in Hogwarts. It was his first home and he loved it and he never wanted to leave, but still—things needed to change. They shouldn’t be falling to pieces because of stupidity after the last war when the Muggles were breeding like rabbits and creating ever-more-advanced technology.

“Potter? You okay there?” Longbottom said.

“Yeah, fine,” Harry said, shaking out of it. “Sorry, lost in thought.”

Bole said something about some wizarding author’s latest novel and promptly started an argument about whether the plot twist at the end was justified or not. Harry half-listened for the cultural references but he was thinking about something else.

Harry was the Boy Who Lived. He had fame, and influence, and a reputation, and Dumbledore was going to keep him restricted so for now he was going to be stuck during the summers, but during the school year—during the school year he could be the model student. He could represent Slytherin, change its reputation, collect useful people from all three other Houses and tie them to him for the group of people he’d always wanted to build, make them _his_. They could change things inside Hogwarts and make it stronger, and then when they left he’d make the _world_ his.

His good mood lasted right up until they got off the train and Harry’s acquaintances said goodbye and rejoined their families. Harry lugged his trunk over to the Floo and watched as a slender young woman in businesslike gray robes looked Theo over and ushered him into the Floo without a backwards glance. Longbottom’s parents weren’t there but his grandmother was, wearing a vulture on her hat and terrifying everyone around her. Weasley was being absorbed back into the redheaded amoeba of other Weasleys and Malfoy’s mother was there like some kind of blond ice statue in robes. Even Dean Thomas, a Gryffindor Harry had seen on the platform back in September—he was being hugged by his mum and welcomed even though she was obviously a Muggle. Lucky bastard.

All of them—all of them got to be part of the world they _belonged_ to over the summer. All of them got to be _magicals_. While he got exiled to Saint Hedwig’s with the idiotic Muggle children, all because of Dumbledore.

Scowling, Harry yanked his trunk and Aoife’s cage into the Floo and returned to Mrs. Figg’s cottage for tea.

 

Fletcher Giles seemed to have gotten a new crony, a brutish thirteen-year-old with a brain apparently powered by a rusty hamster wheel. They were waiting in Harry’s room by the time he got his trunk up the stairs. Giles slammed the door and the brute was on Harry before he could dodge. The first swing disoriented him.

The second broke his nose and put him on the ground.

The third was a kick and it cracked two ribs and Harry’s self-control.

By the time he staggered to his feet, Giles and the brute had both screamed themselves to the point of losing their voices, jittering around on the floor in pain. Harry was panting and not even sure what all his magic was doing, except blocking the screams and making them. Feel. _Pain._

He only stopped it when he felt exhaustion start tremors in his legs. 

Raza slid out of his bag as Harry slumped back on the bed. _“You did well, hatchling. They needed to learn. I’ve always said you were too kind to these pieces of wormfood.”_

 _“I should’ve listened,”_ Harry said. Circe, his nose hurt. It wasn’t the first time it had broken but… _“Episkey,”_ he muttered, missing his wand. He didn’t have enough magic left to do much but it at least jerked back into place with a jolt of pain that brought tears to his eyes and left him gasping and clinging to the bedframe.

A glance in the mirror showed he had two blooming black eyes but his nose was set. Harry stuffed some of the food he’d hidden into his trunk down his throat, staggered to the bathroom for water, and came back feeling somewhat better. By midnight he had enough magic back to levitate both unconscious idiots back into their room.

 

The boys were taken to the hospital the next morning. Everyone suspected Harry but none of the kids had seen or heard anything.

Sister Cassidy and Sister Ruth, both of them young and silly, crossed themselves whenever they saw him. Harry sneered at anyone who got in his path and decided he was only leaving his room to eat or visit his one magical contact, Mrs. Figg. He hadn’t expected to send anyone to the hospital on his first night back.

But they’d forced his hand.

 _Muggle idiots,_ Harry found himself thinking more frequently with every day that passed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who's left comments or kudos, or just lurked silently in my hit counter ;) 
> 
> A/N 1: I'm borrowing a little bit from the end of Philosopher's Stone plot here, I know. Mild spoiler, but so you know, Quirrell's attempted robbery wasn't random, or an isolated incident. It and he are part of something bigger. i'm just not saying what yet, because our sans-Voldemort antagonistic plot forces are subtler than attaching 1/128th of a soul in a creepy wraith thing to the back of someone's head under a turban. 
> 
> Actually they're just subtler than canon-Voldemort in general... :D 
> 
> A/N 2: A/N because someone might otherwise yell at me about Hermione not being “the brightest”: I’m from the United States. I’ve lived here all my life. If I were to move to, say, South Africa, or India, or Japan, even if I was fluent in the local language, and take a history class, my previous history lessons would be mostly irrelevant. And I did the IB program, which has an international focus. I looked at the Americas in the last 150 years, first at their relationships with each other and then their place in a world context. And I still couldn’t learn fluent Japanese and walk into a Japanese high school history class and know what the f*** is happening more than probably 10-15% of the time. Now imagine that for Muggleborns. They’re entering this school where an entire HUGE portion of history has been hidden their entire lives. The Statute of Secrecy was signed in 1692 according to Harry Potter Wiki. Most of history happened BEFORE that, meaning most of Muggle history has been scrubbed of magic (badly, ergo superstitions and cryptids and Irish fey folklore etc.) and Muggleborns are basically walking into history classes in a country they literally did not know existed until they were 11. Wizarding children, on the other hand, grew up hearing these stories, their parents talk politics, their tutoring sessions talking about history, their books referencing historical battles, and so on, regardless of their politics in this politically-focused AU. On top of that, in canon, we had Binns, an undeniably incapable teacher. He might have known a lot but if you can’t hold a class’s interest or be bothered to remember their names, you shouldn’t be teaching. He droned on about giant wars centuries in the past, which may be relevant to current conflicts, but literally all we ever see Harry write about on exams is “Uric the Oddball” and random people who are completely irrelevant. Hermione, I contend, kicks ass in that class in canon because *she is the only one who stays awake and listens.* (possibly also the Slytherins. 80% of the Ravenclaws I know would bring their own books to that class or just nap.) Binns lectured about things that were not very relevant to modern politics and therefore not discussed much in wizarding homes; he tested what he lectured and nothing more. That’s why Hermione did well and the wizard kids’ advantage was lessened. This AU has a competent history teacher regardless of bias, who teaches history that will one day be relevant. Harry plays cultural catch-up all year. So does Hermione although we don’t see it on page because that’s who she is, but neither she nor Harry can close that gap in the span of one year. With competent teachers, even though they slow it down, even the wizarding kids have a huge advantage. Also, I have Harry beating her in everything else because he’s thrown himself into wizarding culture and history on every level, including casual use of magic and comfort with a wand, on a level canon-Hermione and au-Hermione have not. There's something to be said for growing up aware of the existence of magic, relying on it, and immersed in the casual daily use of it for ease with wands and spellcasting that Muggle-raised kids probably just can't have first year.  
> Thank you for coming to my TED talk. 
> 
> A/N 3: Would you look at that, it's done! And it's the end of March... which means... Sarcasm and Slytherin might start posting again in the next few days... hint hint ;)


	10. NEWS

I've been getting a lot of questions if this AU will continue. The answer is yes, most definitely! I love the Souls Touch AU, and I have the plot up to year 6 hammered out with a rough outline of the rest in my head. On the other hand, I did promise my S&S readers that I'd give that fic priority since I started it first, which I think is fair. Souls Touch will be going on indefinite hiatus. Humility aside, I tend to write quickly, so at a guess I'll be back here at the end of the (northern hemisphere lol) summer at the latest. I have a work titled Notifications in my Sarcasm and Slytherin series where I post news and/or changes in my update schedule, so subscribe to that if you'd like to be kept abreast of my progress. Thanks to all the commenters, kudo-leavers, and lurking readers; you are amazing and this fandom keeps my motivation alive when real life is trying to kill it. 

 

A few fic recs for the interim, especially if S&S is not your cup of tea, which has been the case for at least a few people (i don't blame you, it's not super similar to this fic): 

Scales of Change on ff.net by NightHawk97

The Well Groomed Mind on ff.net by LadyKhali

The Prince of Slytherin on ff.net by The Sinister Man

The Green Girl and Lady of the Lake on ff.net by Colubrina

Man at the Right Hand on aO3 by BeastOfTheSea

Business on AO3 by esama

Brothers Divided on AO3 by jeleania

Charlotte the Great and Powerful on AO3 by Evandar

necessary evil on AO3 by IceisAwesome

Amethyst on AO3 by geoffaree


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